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92POINTS
17/20
Callejuela Las Mercedes 2019
Sherry Jerez - Manzanilla, SpainBrothers Pepe y Paco produce some incredibly dynamic Palominos from el Marco de Jerez, some fortified and some not, and some with flor and some without. Their father, Francisco Blanco Martínez, ‘el Blanquito’ founded the business in 1980. Originally, he worked as an almacenista de mosto, farming his own vineyards and selling the base wine to bottling houses. His sons came on board in the late 1990s, and consolidated the operation in a cellar atop the slope of Pago el Hornillo on the estuary side of Sanlúcar de Barrameda. Today they own 28 hectares of vines across four pagos. Las Mercedes is a parcel in the Albariza de lentejuelas soils of Añina, near the coast and with ample sea swept winds. The juice is fermented in old Manzanilla botas, and the wine is aged on fine lees with 10% ullage for 7 months of ageing under a thin film of flor. The thin film, combined with shorter ageing, emphasizes more of the Albariza limestone over the yeast. Pouring a shining golden yellow, this medium+ white is showing ample marine minerality and salinity, livening green apple, hay, pear skin, crystalline lemon peel, stretched along a deep chalk base. You can feel the earthiness of the flor here, but it is a sheen in the background, rather than the forerunner of this complexed, lively wine. Many beautiful, savoury, salty layers to unravel in this open white, drinking perfectly now.Tasted: 08 April 2021Tasted by: Treve RingPrices:| BC | $36.99 | 500ml | select private retailers |
Grape: Palomino FinoCSPC: 43740UPC: 8437004778147
