About a decade ago I was alarmed by the trend for making
white Rioja in an unoaked style – all but the hoariest bodegas suddenly seemed
to be at it. I remember one winemaker expressing her surprise that I could
still think of white Rioja as an oaky product at all. The trend, I think, was
being driven by envy at the stratospheric rise of Albariño as the Spanish white
wine of the (apparent?) connoisseur, initially inside Spain and later
internationally.
The trouble with making white Rioja in an unoaked
style is Viura, the base grape of the region – it likes oak, and dislikes being
divested of it. Having relatively little native fruit flavour, it is never
going to be able to offer the fresh fruit zing of an Albariño; made unoaked, it
seemed to me Rioja was now producing a legion of bland white wines which tasted
(if they were lucky) of Granny Smith apples and not a great deal else, and which
could have come from anywhere.
Our bottle of Vetiver de Ontañón was corked (more
wet wood than damp cellar), but the basic character was nevertheless clear; I
was pleased at least to see that it is part of the growing wave of wines from
bodegas who have realised that white Rioja does, after all, need oak contact, even
if not in the high amounts of yesteryear. As well as depth, creaminess and
aging potential, oak helps bring out a more vivid fruit character in these
wines; in this case, through the unwelcome corkiness we glimpsed lemon and
orange and a well-structured wine.
Not rated.
