Bodegas Ponce

WINE TALK
1

I’ve tasted a range of Bodegas Ponce wines over the past few weeks. I didn’t love every one of them, but there were some marvellous highlights. Overall, I thought the wines were great value and highly distinctive. I see some love on the board but I’m curious to hear the views of those who’ve tried Ponce wines. What do you think? How good / undervalued do you think these wines are? Have you tried the “Ponce” red bottling, or any of the others I haven’t tasted below? There’s plenty of good information about the winery, region, and varieties online, which can make good reading if interested.

2024 Bodegas Ponce Manchuela Ponce Blanco
Popped and poured. 100% Albillo. Pale lemon appearance. Medium intensity nose with a mix of primary and tertiary aromas. On the primary side - lemon, grapefruit. On the tertiary side - almond, dried apple, hay, toast. On the palate, dry / medium+ acidity / low end of medium alcohol (12.5%) / medium body / medium+ flavour intensity with very clear delineation of flavours. The wine has a long finish with waves of savoury, saline elements.

Very good quality and great value at US$15. Delicious, refined, and very interesting wine for the price. (90 points)

2024 Bodegas Ponce Manchuela Clos Lojen
Popped and poured. Deep ruby appearance. 100% Bobal. Medium intensity nose dominated by black cherry, black plum, blackberry, a touch of red fruits also with red plum and raspberry. A slight candied nature to the fruits. A little dried herb, spicy black pepper, and chocolate.

On the palate, dry / medium+ acidity / medium tannin / medium alcohol / medium body / medium flavour intensity / medium finish. Good quality and fairly priced at US$9.

A little hard to evaluate this. The balance feels a little off, particularly with the acidity overpowering the fruit intensity and the alcohol (despite being low) feeling a little sinewy. In the end, it just doesn’t feel like something I want to drink. I see a lot of praise for this as a bargain so there may just be something about this that clashes with my personal preference. I’ll try another bottle but based on this showing would prefer to spend a little more for the other Ponce Bobals. (84 points)

2023 Bodegas Ponce Manchuela La Casilla
Popped and poured. Dark ruby appearance. 100% Bobal. Medium + intensity nose of blackberry, dark plum, black cherry, raspberry, violet, Ras el Hanout, rosemary. On the palate, dry / medium+ acidity / medium tannins that are very fine and velvety / medium alcohol (13%) / medium+ body / medium+ flavour intensity / medium+ finish that ends with a lovely streak of minerality that reminded me of great Syrah.

This has a lovely combination of juicy fruit, fine tannin, and complex minerality. Fantastic to both drink and savour. Great value at US$14. (91 points)

2024 Bodegas Ponce Manchuela La Estrecha
Popped and poured. 90% Bobal / 10% field blend. Medium ruby appearance. Medium+ intensity nose of red cherry, raspberry, red currant - red fruit dominated but with flecks of dark. Fruits complemented by dried herbs and streaks of iron and stone. A slight animal character to this but it’s complementary rather than distracting. On the palate, dry / high acidity / medium tannins that are super soft & refined / medium alcohol (13%) / medium body / medium+ intensity with very good definition of flavours. Long finish with lots of stony minerality and intriguing citrus twists of lime & blood orange,

Outstanding quality. As with the La Casilla, this has a remarkable combination of juicy fruit, fine tannin, and minerality but there are a few extra layers of complexity here. Great value at US$26 and I will look to pick up some more. Will certainly improve with aging. (93 points)

2024 Bodegas Ponce Manchuela Depaula
Popped and poured. 100% Monastrell. Deep ruby appearance. Medium+ intensity nose of dark plum, blackberry, blueberry. Quite floral and fragrant with violet, dried herbs, and a touch of mint. On the palate, dry / medium acidity / medium- tannin that’s a little grainier than the Bobal’s / high alcohol (14%) which warms the throat slightly / medium+ body / medium flavour intensity / medium+ finish.

Good quality. No doubt this is a very distinctive wine. There’s a very interesting flavour profile on the palate with a characterful earthy minerality from the mid-palate to the finish. However, there are just a couple of issues with the intensity being too low which in turn affects the balance with the alcohol.

Good value at US$10, but at the same time I don’t think I’d buy again preferring instead to drink the Bobals. This note is a little all over the place which I think is a reflection of the unique nature of this wine. (88 points)

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I have enjoyed the Clos Lojen over the years, always a great value but I do think there is pretty noticeable vintage variance, some years I buy a lot and some years I get a few bottles and don’t restock. Maybe two years ago my go to retailer added the rest of the line and I would definitely agree with you that the La Casilla is a big step up for just a little price increase. I actually prefer it to the La Estrechas that I’ve had. I don’t remember having the chance to try the Blanco or the very top end red, but this is a good reminder to pick up a couple of bottles of the Blanco to check out.

3

Noted on the Clos Lojen. It is a wine I want to retry so I’ll try a different vintage along with the ’24 in line with your comment. Why do you prefer the La Casilla to the La Estrecha?

Either way, I think the Ponce approach of old vine, whole cluster, gentle extraction, spontaneous fermentation leads to remarkable outcomes across these two wines. Sometimes these terms are used as labels but here you can see a very clear stylistic result in the balance of fruit purity, tannin quality, spicy complexity, and minerality. This is even more remarkable given the historical reputation of Bobal.

4

Thanks for the report! It’s great to see such detailed notes on such reasonably priced wines on this board.

I had never heard of this Bodega until just now, but I will seek out the wines.

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5

I only know the bianco, but second the thought that it is a very serious wine at its pricepoint (which at my market is more like $20 than $15 these days).

6

I’d happily still be buying bottles of the Bianco at US$20. And If I look at my score to price ratio for white wines this year (crude and undignified I know…), I’d say I could easily justify a value closer to US$30. I do strongly recommended the Bobal wines if you can find.

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7

I think my preference for the La Casilla over the La Estrecha might be because of what you described in your great note as “streaks of iron and stone”? The couple of times that I’ve been able to taste both back to back I think that ferric note felt a little out of balance where the La Casilla which is probably the simpler wine just seemed really well put together. I’ve never had the La Estrecha with any real age on it and would imagine that I might feel differently about the two if they were a little further down their respective roads. Again glad you posted your notes on these and I agree with Dan that it is nice to see such detailed notes on these reasonable wines!

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That makes a lot of sense. There is certainly something a little edgy about the single-vineyard La Estrecha. I would assume the blend in La Casilla smooths out some of those edges making for a delicious, balanced drink.

One other thing I noticed is that La Estrecha actually has a 10% field blend component (the tech sheet on their website has a copy-and-paste error, I believe, so it doesn’t list this). It’s quite rare for me to notice prominent citrus notes on the finish of a red wine (lime and blood orange), so I wonder whether the inclusion of white varieties such as Marisancho contributes to that citrus character. I may write to them about this. Regardless, I think that twist on the finish also adds to the wine’s edgy character, along with the ferric, mineral elements you reference.