It seems that everywhere one turns in Spain, there is wine. Not just in the usual places like bars, stores, and restaurants but in unexpected venues like the butcher shop, cheese vendors, artisanal pastelerías, coffee shops, and even mini-marts at gas stations. All feature local and small producers. This isn’t surprising, because Spain is the second-largest wine producer in the world after Italy. Spain also has the world’s largest surface area of vines, with almost a million hectares spread across some 4,300 wineries. However, only 11% is devoted to organic grapes. Today, 85% of organic Spanish wine is slated for export. The numbers and our experiences confirm that being organic is not a significant criterion Spaniards use when deciding what to drink.
Wine culture has run deep for centuries, and wine bars abound. A charming example is Vineria San Telmo in Sevilla. The chatty, charismatic owner, Juan Manuel Tarquini Alexeew, opened endless bottles of his ethical wines for us. All are among his personal favorites, coming from dedicated small producers. Our favorites were those made from Mencia grapes found in the Ribeira Sacras region.
While ethical wine bars are rare, natural wine sellers exist. We found Al Sur de Granada, a petite corner store in Granada. This tiny establishment packs a big punch. Along with selling 120+ wines from small producers, employee Jessica Merlo teaches in-person and online natural wine classes. Her goal is to help consumers understand these wines’ value proposition and distinctive characteristics. Spanish sommeliers from across the country are attending.
In Spain, wine bars go hand-in-hand with small plates of food, known as tapas, served with drinks. We heard multiple stories about the origin of this custom. None of them seemed overly plausible, but we were told that in the 13th C, King Alfonse X was ill, and his doctor prescribed nine glasses of wine a day. Fearing he would become inebriated, Alfonse consumed a small amount of food with each glass of wine. He was so pleased with the result that he decreed taverns must do the same.
There is another version of the origin story: a royal servant was afraid flies would get into pre-poured glasses of wine, so he put a “top” (in Spanish, “tapa”) on each glass. While surveying his handiwork, he thought the empty plates looked silly, so he added a bit of food (a slice of cheese or ham) to each. People were so pleased with their culinary morsels that the practice remained.
Or, finally, for culinary pragmatists: Since the Spanish eat such a late dinner, tapas serve as a tide-me-over until 10:00 pm, a respectable supper hour.
Most people drink wines from hyper-local producers. In the north, Catalonians drink wine from Catalonia. In Andalusia, where we were, consumption is so specific people often drink what their neighbors bottle.
Everyone knows their local vineyards. So, it’s unsurprising that an olive and almond farmer from Ronda sent us down the road to Bodega Schatz, a Biodynamic producer.
Friedrich Schatz traces his wine-making roots back to 1641 when his Tyrolean family emigrated to Germany, where they made wine for hundreds of years. Friedrich was in line to inherit the business but instead struck out in search of a more favorable growing environment, which he found in 1982 in this unique Spanish micro-climate. He explained, “We’re only 50km from Africa, 80km from the Atlantic Ocean, and the nearby Sierras de Nievas have a cooling effect, so much so that in the past, wealthy Spaniards came to Ronda during the heat of summer.” As an aside, he added, “They didn’t want a seaside suntan because that was a sign of servitude.”
According to Friedrich, the nearby town of Grazalema is the rainiest place in Europe from October to May, and then nothing falls for the next six months, an ideal pattern for growing organic grapes.
Friedrich wasn’t the first to realize the terroir around Ronda was perfect for viniculture. The area traces its winemaking history back to the Phoenicians (800BC) and experienced a golden age under the Romans (100BC). But, by the time Friedrich arrived, 2,200 years after the Romans, the fields he purchased contained indigenous grapes, which weren’t productive and didn’t match the wine he envisioned himself making.
So, he ripped out the vines and planted varieties he knew from further north, like Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Petit Verdot, Lemberger, and Moscatel Negro. He firmly believed that biodynamic principles combined with his intensive, focused efforts would allow these grapes to express their characteristics fully.
We’ve visited many vineyards, but this winemaker’s keen attention to Biodynamic farming practices exceeded anything we’ve encountered. For example, all Biodynamic farmers must bury compost, known as “tea,” in a cow’s horn. Friedrich insists the horn be from a seven-year-old cow because this is the ideal number of moon cycles for the animal to have experienced.
Additionally, he leaves vineyard cuttings combined with charcoal (from burnt cuttings) where they fall so that the mixture can serve as a cooling mulch and water storage system during the hot, dry summer months, thus reducing his carbon dioxide “footprint.” He also plants legumes between the vines to boost the soil’s nitrogen level.
To say Friedrich and his wife are ‘hands-on” is an understatement. They do All harvesting by hand, which is an achievable task because different varietals ripen at different times. However, as suggested in Biodynamic farming, he only picks on a “fruit” or “flower” day, corresponding to the moon’s relationship to various constellations.
He employs fiberglass storage tanks in the cellar because they maintain their temperature without adding heating/cooling elements—another energy-saving measure. The little energy the vinting requires comes from solar panels, the first installed in Andalusia.
Aging is done in oak barrels with precision we’ve seldom encountered. Friedrich uses five different oaks from three other countries because, according to him, “My father and I both felt the specific wood heavily influences the wine.” He added, “We never add yeast during fermentation. The natural yeast on healthy plants makes the best wine.”
Lastly, Friedrich employs a crystallization analysis done by a specialized outside lab, enabling him to determine whether the wine’s structure is perfect or has deficiencies that must be corrected. “This technique allows us to determine the health of the soil and the roots, which assists us in making interventions as the grapes grow.” He must be doing something right because half of his wines are exported to regions as far away as Asia.
While Andalusia is most famous as the home of bullfighting, a more peaceful pastime thrives throughout the province. So, the next time you’re in Southern Spain’s Andalusia province, live like a local and find a wine bar with tapas and ethical wines.
