Emilio Rojo 2020

Nervy and flinty minerality gives energy and verve to the creamy lemon pastries on the nose. Textured and medium- to full-bodied on the palate with an elegant, nuanced finish. Quintessential. Drink now or hold.

The 2020 Emilio Rojo was produced from the Emilio Rojo vineyard by the Viña Mein/Carraovejas team and is a blend of the multiple varieties (Treixadura, Albariño, Loureira, Torrontés, Godello, Lado, Caíño Blanco...) that he planted in his 1.2 hectares of terraced vines. Farming has been transformed to organic, which was a struggle (this was the first year and yields dropped dramatically), but they are starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel and believe the 2023 harvest is their best so far, when they will go back to the approximately 5,000-bottle mark. In 2020, the grapes were picked the 29th of August and the 7th of September, the clusters were pressed and the juice let to settle and fermented with indigenous yeasts in stainless steel and a 700-liter concrete egg, where the wine matured for one year. (They started to use the egg by chance that year and liked it very much, so they have used ever since.) It has 12% alcohol and mellow acidity, reflecting a warm and healthy harvest. The nose is phenomenal, detailed, nuanced and elegant with notes of moss and wet stones, and the seamless palate has pungent flavors and great length and persistence. 1,731 bottles and 50 magnums were produced, a very short crop. It was bottled in November 2021.