For me the Solear en rama are the real jewel in the Barbadillo crown, one of my favourite wines and one of the most influential, important releases in the recent history of the sherry triangle.
They are a fascinating wine in themselves, a manzanilla with an average of 10 years under flor in an unspecified number of classes (the manzanilla term for criaderas) in a gigantic solera of 13,050 botas spread across five different bodegas. Barbadillo’s master winemaker Montse Molina has been releasing 100 magnums and an unspecified number of half bottles every season of every year since 2009. They were the first major release of en ramas and the seasonal sacas were revolutionary, providing a very useful insight into the action of the flor. In general, the winter and spring sacas benefit from more vigorous flor, while the summer and autumn sacas less so. When you add in variations in climate from year to year and season to season it can be remarkable how differently the wines - all from the same solera and bodega - show.
A really nice detail is that they decorate the label with the images of the local wildlife - a different species of bird or animal every saca. It is a tribute to the Doñana national park that you can literally see across the river from Sanlucar - one of the great wild spaces in Spain and one that to a large extent owes its survival to the naturalist tendencies of previous generations of winemakers.
The result is a beautiful collection in every sense - the wine itself is fantastic and the differences between sacas generate expectation time after time. The labels are attractive individually and together even more so. I have only been at them for the last four years and only started taking notes in the last couple of years, but already I have a nice little collection.
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From left to right we have:
• Winter 2013 aka Blacktailed Godwit - (preblog and no TN);
• Autumn 2014 aka Stonechat - (preblog and no TN);
• Winter 2014 aka the Serin/Siskin - Solear en rama – Saca de Invierno 2014 | undertheflor.com;
• Spring 2015 aka the Golden Oriole - Solear en rama – Saca de Primavera 2015 | undertheflor.com;
• Summer 2015 aka Rednecked Nightjar - Solear en rama – Saca de Verano 2015 | undertheflor.com;
• Autumn 2015 aka the Dormouse - Manzanilla en rama Solear autumn 2015 – again again | undertheflor.com;
• Winter 2015 aka the Razorbill - Manzanilla en rama Solear – saca de invierno 2015 | undertheflor.com;
• Spring 2016 aka the Roller - Solear en rama spring 2016 | undertheflor.com
As you can see it is one of the wines I try most regularly (many of them I have written two or three notes about). I have also had a chance to taste them alongside other wines.
• First - against a very different wine - one of Equipo Navazos’ “Fino que va para amontillado” - El fino que va para amontillado vs Solear en Rama | undertheflor.com
• Second - against two differnt styles of manzanilla - Three Manzanillas | undertheflor.com
• Last, and tonight, the latest two sacas against each other - Manzanilla Monday head to head | undertheflor.com - something I am going to come back to in future.
Really a fantastic series of wines - if you get a chance to try them and, even better, collect them, I really recommend it.[ResizeableImage=][/ResizeableImage]