Wine & Spirits - August 2020 - 11

"pálido." So, we began a long correspondence as I tried to ascertain what
was, in fact, the historical basis of this wine. Esteban de Iscar continued
to patiently answer my queries with information about Rueda in centuries past, rather than anything specific about Pálido. And with as much
patience as I could muster in my computer-generated Spanish, I asked
him point-blank: Were there, in fact, wines called Pálido in the past?
There were no branded wines in the past, he responded. "And there
were no labels for Pálido. The names of these wines were 'White Wines,'
to which, on occasion, their geographical origin was added, such as, for
example, wines from the Tierra de Medina, Rueda, La Nava, La Seca,
Serrada, which are today the towns that form the heart of DO Rueda."
The quality of the wine was distinguished by its price, he told me in his
email. Wines were also distinguished by their aging methods-new,
aged, quatro añejo, trasañejo and older wines, based on time in barrel.
"At the turn of the 20th century, some wines began to be called rancio
or soleras, taking into account their different forms of production and
aging." That's when people began to use terms like Dorado and Pálido
to name the wine, terms that are now codified by the DO.
To clarify his point, Esteban de Iscar cited records from 19th-century
associations of expert wine judges who would grant diplomas ranking
the quality of growers' wines, and advise them on how to improve their
production. These judges described the best wines in terms of the ripeness of the fruit and the alcohol level they achieved (above 15 percent),
by their clarity and by their color, often dorado or pálido. Fortified for
long preservation, these wines were suited for export or for the royal
court, which had, by then, decamped from Valladolid to Madrid.
At the time, any fresh young verdejo would have been sold in the local
tavern. That was, in fact, the reverse of the region's production today,
where the young verdejo, its freshness preserved by cold fermentations
in stainless steel and the cleanliness of modern winemaking, is bound
for markets throughout Spain and for export, while these traditional
styles of fortified wines are a local curiosity.
Eventually, I shared my own interest in Pálido with Esteban de Iscar,
drawing parallels with other wines from limestone soils aged under a
flor of yeasts. But he would have nothing of it.
"The vineyards of Rueda sit on gravel terraces left by rivers over the
last million years, and formed by soils of quartzite rock mixed with sand.
They are not limestone soils," he wrote. "They are permeable soils, with
abundant rock, at 750 meters of altitude...Nothing to do with the soils
of the Jerez area, neither by soil, nor by climate, nor by altitude, nor by
proximity to the sea."

- S PRESIDENT OF THE DO RUEDA, CARMEN SAN MARTIN HAS CHAMPIONED
A
THE HISTORIC STYLES OF FORTIFIED WINES, BOTH DORADO AND PALIDO,
THAT HER FAMILY CONTINUES TO PRODUCE AT BODEGAS DE ALBERTO.

"THE VINEYARDS OF RUEDA SIT ON GRAVEL TERRACES LEFT BY
RIVERS OVER THE LAST MILLION YEARS." -MIGUEL ESTEBAN DE ISCAR

I had clearly touched a nerve. But now, I was completely confused.
Even in his own thesis, he describes the soil as "the so-called limestones
of the Moors." Then he describes how this limestone was reconfigured
over several geological eras through river erosion, tectonics and climate
to evolve into the often deep, sandy soils growers farm today.
Having spent some time in vineyards with Pedro Parra, the winefocused geologist, I wondered if anyone knew for certain that such a
region, once primarily limestone, no longer had any relevant limestone
in the vineyard soils.
Parra acknowledged that it would be impossible to know without
digging multiple soil pits-that it would depend on the specific site.
He had studied a vineyard along the Ebro River in Rioja, for example,
and turned up five varied soils that were, in some way, a result of the
river's geological activity: some alluvial terraces with gravel, sand and
iron, some with gravel, sand and a little limestone, some with no gravel
or sand, but limestone, along with other areas where there was limestone in varied stages of deterioration, what he terms alterite. For a
study Parra did in Ribera del Duero, he found the river laid out alluvial
terraces with clay and gravel, or sand, gravel and iron, or deep clay, or
deep, silty sand. And he also found areas of limestone rock, of limestone
sand and of limestone alterite. At both vineyards, the grower may have
thought they had alluvial soils, but a detailed study revealed a more
complex soil situation.
As for Rueda and the rivers that rearranged its soils, "Is it possible that
there is limestone involved?" Parra mused. Referencing a soil study of
the region done by the DO, he said, "If you look at the pH of the soil in
the map, it goes from 5.5 (not limestone) to 8.6 (limestone). So, without digging soil pits, the only way to really know is by tasting." In fact,
Parra has become adept at identifying the mother rock in vineyards by
the taste and structure of the wine. "With whites, it is more difficult to
identify, because you can confuse the tension in a wine from gravels
with the tension in a wine from limestone, especially if there is a touch
of limestone in the gravels."
Was it the taste of gravels or of limestone that so caught my attention
in that Serrada wine under flor? I'll have to convince Parra to dig some
soil pits. Or maybe, in this case, it's more about the population of yeasts.
In either case, as an acolyte of Jura wines and Fino Sherry, I'll continue
to watch and wait for the return of Rueda Pálido. n
WINE & SPIRITS

AUGUST 2020

Wine & Spirits - August 2020

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