Oh they’ve finally released it! Haven’t seen it anywhere yet and their website had 1996 as their most recent vintage for GRB, which is why I missed it.
In the US there is some major price-gouging going on - listings from $400-600:
https://www.wine-searcher.com/find/r+lopez+de+heredia+vina+tondonia+grand+rsrv+blanco+doca+rioja+alta+spain/2001/usa
Presumably the WA score of 99 has something to do with this, prompting all sorts of collectors (including those building collections purely as investments) who have never even had a LdH white to try to acquire some.
I imagine they are in for quite a surprise when/if they taste one.
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What Max said. Awesome lineup. Please do post back on your impressions once you have the event.
Salud,
Mike
Tonight’s the night… I’ll post back with notes tomorrow or as soon as my schedule permits.
I don’t think there is any problem giving such an age-worthy wine as the Gran Reserva’s a little time in the decanter to unfurl and strut its stuff. I know that it helped with the 64s (my birth year) that I’ve enjoyed. Now, that being said, I COMPLETELY agree with you, Chris, on the idea that more so than O2, these wines continue to evolve in evocative ways as they warm in the glass. #awhitethatdrinkslikeared…
Yup indeed they have. My single bottle allocation of this has been sitting in the cellar for just over a week.
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(OOPS - Forgot to hit “send” yesterday… I’ll get my notes together later, but other than the 1987, the wines were great!)
Tonight’s the night… I’ll post back with notes tomorrow or as soon as my schedule permits.
I don’t think there is any problem giving such an age-worthy wine as the Gran Reserva’s a little time in the decanter to unfurl and strut its stuff. I know that it helped with the 64s (my birth year) that I’ve enjoyed. Now, that being said, I COMPLETELY agree with you, Chris, on the idea that more so than O2, these wines continue to evolve in evocative ways as they warm in the glass. #awhitethatdrinkslikeared…
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Hi all,
Sorry for the delay in posting, but I finally had a chance to get back to posting my notes. Suffice to say that with the exception of the 1987, the wines were all tremendous. The bottles were well stored and still had their original paper wrappers on them when my friends and I bought them earlier this year. Our understanding is that they came directly from a distributor that procured them from the importer, Think Global out of Santa Barbara.
We really didn’t do an early decant, but we got to follow them over 6 hours. It was a long, leisurely dinner of tapas and amazing grilled belotta iberico “secret cut” that saw one minute per side over hot wood coals.
We only had two decanters so I somewhat fortuitously decided we would do two flight:
1973, 1981, and 1994 followed by 1987, 91 and 96. I put the '94 first because I’ve had this wine before. It worked out perfectly given that the 1987 was definitely off. I didn’t want it to be off and we gave it every chance to come around, but that just didn’t happen.
Notes:
1973- Great trepidation when we pulled the soaked cork and I did a small pour and stuck my nose in the glass… that lasted about 45 seconds and then it burst forward with bright tangerine scent! A great start, no doubt. Still plenty of acidity and roundness on the palate and after a couple of hours, I revisited the wine to find crushed shells and a bit of anise (which was more pronounced on the 1981). A real treat! How much longer will this go? It has the stuffing, but I think I wouldn’t wait to much longer. In fact, I wonder if this might have been even more wonderful a few years ago.
1981 - Zero concern after pulling the cork! Slightly darker in the decanter than the '73, this was tight at first but after a few minutes began to show bright acidity and a very full palate. It hit the front, the back and the middle just perfectly… Three hours in and this is really beautiful - so rich, yet lithe. Showing dried citrus and anise, then a bit of coffee on the nose. Probably my WOTN, though my friends were enthralled by the '73 as it was the oldest wine at least 2 of them had drank. I don’t have enough experience to say definitively, but I bet it has a few peak years in front of it.
1994 - I love this wine! It was the first bottle drained because it was so damned drinkable! It really hit its stride after hour 2 but drank well all evening. I couldn’t really single out a fruit, or a particular nut, or a singular flavor on the palate - it was just so completely delightful! The finish lasted forever. Would have been the WOTN in nearly any other tasting, but while delicious, I’m not sure it has the stuffing to go long, long, long term (as in 50 years)… plenty of acidity but it was overwhelmed by the charm of the “sweet” finish.
Flight 2
1987 - I’m fairly sensitive to cork taint and my first reaction was to proclaim “this wine is corked!” But it wasn’t… it was just weird… Not oxidized, no TCA… After a few minutes it gave aromas of well worn Western Saddle, then some green apples, then… I don’t know… I wrote that evening that the nose was “messed up” and it was a bit astringent on the palate.
We tasted the 1996 next (for what reason, I don’t remember) at it was fresh and huge on the palate. Super long salty/bright finish,a little nuttiness and fresh anise a bit later. Again, it just hit every spot on the palate that it should and it stayed there more minutes.
1991 - Just like the 1996, but 5 years older, I wrote! Had all the wonderful trappings of the 1996, but just 5 more years to make a more complete wine. “Glorious, weightier and more complete”, to quote from my notes that evening. It’s so hard to proclaim a WOTN when all of these great wines are at different stages of their evolution, but it gave the 1981 a serious run for the money.
The interesting comparison, in my opinion, are the LdH GR Blancos from the 90s… Tough to differentiate them, honestly, other to say that 1994 had that “sweet” finish that leads me to believe that it is the most quaffable today, but that for the long haul, I’d go '96, '91, '94… For today, I would rank them in the opposite - the 94 is such a hedonistic, ready to drink crowd pleaser (comparatively speaking to these wines, of course), followed by 1991, and the 1996… I would be happy to have cellar full of any of these gems.
There you have it. My opinion and your experience may vary… That said… Please don’t search ANY of these wines out. Leave them for me, please! 
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Awesome notes!! Glad they were mostly on point!!
Great tasting, looking forward to the 1 bottle of 94 I have left, sad these have runaway so much in the market (one of the rare wines that’s not really any easier to source in the UK).
Nice notes.
Too bad about the ‘87. Had a great bottle about 3 years ago. It’s a fabulous Tondonia Blanco too.
We had the 1981 Tondonia ( white ) last week in San Sebastian ( restaurant Rekondo ) . The wine was initially dominated by sulphur ( it was not decanted ) . After a while , that blew off and we really enjoyed this peculiar wine . It had candied fruit , citrus and a creamy texture . It continued to evolve in the glass over the next 3 hours without any trace of oxidation , pretty remarkable .
On the label , it said that the wine was aged in barrels for over 20 years and then another 6 years in steel . I’d love to visit that winery . ( they make great aged rose as well ) .
Next to this Tondonia , we tried the 1986 Ygay ( white Rioja ) . This was initially a delicious wine and deteriorated after a while , not unexpectedly .
Is this correct? To my understanding, Heredia’s winemaking has remained pretty unchanged for the longest time (apart from not making any longer those NV Años after their production was prohibited) and from what I’ve understood, Blanco Reserva is aged for 20 years before release, but only 10 years in barrels, because - according to RLdH themselves - 10 years is the maximum a wine is allowed to be aged in barrels in the La Rioja Alta region. This is the first time I hear any Heredia wine would be aged for more than 10 years in oak (apart from those wines from the early part of the 20th century, back then wineries did what they wanted to).
read the label Otto
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Can’t, don’t have any Heredia Gran Reservas at hand at the moment.
However, for all the Gran Reservas I’ve had, the front labels have always looked like this: https://d2mvsg0ph94s7h.cloudfront.net/rhenderson-1464485974-91ac20bd53a9.jpg
And back labels like this: https://i1.wp.com/thewinedepository.com.au/wp-content/uploads/1970/01/R-Lopez-de-Heredia-Vina-Tondonia-Reserva-2001-Back-Label.jpg
Which made me wonder what is going on, since I’ve never seen the labels say a single word about aging the wine. This is also the first time I’ve heard stainless steel being mentioned in the same sentence with Heredia Gran Reservas. Even their website talks about large oak vats and old barriques exclusively, no mentions of stainless steel. I haven’t been there, so can’t comment on the matter myself, but has anyone who has visited RLdH seen stainless steel tanks there?
I don’t recall any stainless. AFAIK GR Blanco spends 6 years in neutral barrels and then many years in the cellar in bottle before release. I have a bottle of 81 at home still in original paper wrap so I can’t see the label. I’ll look at some photos.
Confirmed:
Jason , our label was in Spanish and it said : aged in barrels for 268 months . It may be another bottle ? Our front label mentions Vina Tondonia , Cosecha de 1981 . ( not Branco gran reserva )
This is a Portuguese back label I just found on the internet. 268 months in barrel doesn’t make any sense.
I know , my Spanish sucks .