Alberto Orte 'Poniente' Fino Sherry, Jerez DO

Alberto Orte 'Poniente' Fino Sherry, Jerez DO

Item Number: 13711

UPC: 8-437015799896

Country: Spain
Region: Andalucia
Sub Region: Jerez
Appellation/AVA: Jerez DO
Estate Grown Wine: No
Grape(s): 100% Palomino
Type: Wine - Fortified
Bottle Size: 750 ml
Pack: 6
Closure: Cork
Alc by Vol(%): 15
Viticulture: Practicing Organic
Soil Type: Albariza

The Poniente Fino comes from a system of four criaderas and one solera, with a median age of over 8 years. The wines used to refresh the 4th criadera comes from Alberto's organically farmed estate vineyards in the Pago Añina, from a meticulous clonal selection of more than 200 ancient and mostly forgotten clones of Palomino. The first saca (bottling) of this wine occurred after 2 years resting in the winery. The wine was not fined and only lightly filtered.

A gentle decanting will help the wine express itself more swiftly. The qualities that develop with time will differ from the young wine, gradually deepening the secondary characteristics and losing the more primary "biological" notes. Serve the Poniente Fino chilled.

About Bodegas Poniente: Following the arc of history, winemaker Alberto Orte embraces his family’s rich tradition of solera system wines from Montilla-Moriles to create this unparalleled sherry project. Bodegas Poniente is named after the cool western Atlantic Poniente winds.

Bodegas Poniente sherries are the product of the thoughtful blending of precious, treasured soleras and criaderas from the 18th and 19th centuries with wine from Alberto's estate vineyards. Over the past few years, Alberto Orte has carefully selected and purchased old soleras and criaderas from sherry bodegas. These soleras are then refreshed in the traditional method each year with Alberto's estate production. Some of the resulting wines are over 40 years old and can be officially classified as VORS.

Alberto Orte owns 16 hectares of vines on pure albariza soil. The vineyard sites San Cristóbal, San José, and El Aljibe are located in the Pago Añina, one of three known pago sites in Jerez designated as Jerez Superior. 21 different grape varieties are planted in Viña San Cristóbal; such varieties include Tintilla and Vijiriega and many old clones of Palomino, some of which are over 60 years old. They are planted in the old format, trained in the traditional vara y pulgar, and farmed organically. The wines are produced and aged at the historical estate, a restored house tucked among the vines of El Aljibe.

Reviews

  • The Wine Advocate
    Rating: 94 (6/28/2019)
    The golden colored and pungent NV Fino was bottled for the first time in 2018 (marked with a neck label that says "Saca 1/18"), and the idea is to do one single bottling per year. The wine comes from three vineyards in Pago Añína on albariza soils, so it's a single-vineyard Fino, fermented in bota like yesteryear and organized in four criaderas and one solera that averages over eight years of age. The younger criadera is topped up with the wine from their own vineyards. The winery where the wine matures is halfway between Jerez and Sanlúcar, so it combines the active flor from the cooler location and the volume of a wine that is only bottled and refreshed once per year. It feels old, complex, developed and with volume, with classical aromas and a bone-dry palate. Superb!