Las Gundiñas, La Vizcaina de Vinos, Bierzo, 2017
Smooth, ripe and easy going, Las Gundinas 2019 offers a certain breadth and wildness replete with sweet red fruits and truffley earth notes. In 2019 Pérez worked to offset some of the vineyard’s natural richness by introducing it to larger barrels and reducing the overall time in oak, instead racking and returning to the original large wooden fermentation tanks for the first few months and then aging in 500L and foudré until September. This cuvee seems to be growing in refinement every year. A south east facing vineyard planted on clay heavy soils at 450-500m. Its warmer exposition and flatter topography versus the other La Vizcaina wines tends to produce fuller bodied, more savoury wines.
critic reviews
Brilliant ruby. Dark berries, cherry, potpourri and licorice aromas are complemented by pungent floral and smoky mineral accents. Deep and chewy on the palate, offering cassis, bitter cherry, floral pastille and fruitcake flavors supported by a core of juicy acidity. A smoky nuance appears on the long, dark-fruit-driven finish, where slowly building tannins provide shape and final grip.
La Gundinas is the wine that shows the most differences between 2017 and 2018. The 2017 La Vizcaina Las Gundinas is dark and concentrated, a wine of sun, while the 2018 is delicate and feels like a mini Bonnes Mares! This is quite like a Cornasmeaty, juicy, a little reticent and powerful, with abundant tannins. This is one wine that behaves better in 2017 than in 2016. This is a plot that has ups and down; it might be more regular in the future, as they finally bought it in 2018. Some 5,500 bottles produced. It was bottled in May 2019.