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While I have enjoyed these Rioja at 100 articles, I am little confused that many of the tasting notes start with “Tasted blind” but go on to reference the winery and/or wine within the tasting note (and not in a way that suggests a guess). By way of examples (of which there are many), the tasting note for Marqués de Vargas, Hacienda Pradolagar Tempranillo/Mazuelo Viñedo Singular 2018 Rioja states “I have always been a strong supporter of the Vargas style…. A fabulous, haute-couture expression of Vargas” and the tasting note for Ortega Ezquerro, OE Tudelilla Garnacha Vino de Pueblo 2024 Rioja states “Tudelilla continues to establish itself as one of Spain’s most exciting villages for Garnacha.” Were the tasting notes written - or perhaps changed / added to - after the identities of the wines were revealed?
Thank you very much for your comment and interest. It is always wonderful to receive thoughtful feedback like yours.
All the wines are tasted blind, usually in flights of around 8–10 wines. For this particular article, I tasted about 90 wines per day. During the tasting session itself, I only see the numbered glasses, without any information about the wines.
Once the tasting session is finished, I open all the bottles and reveal their identities. This is actually one of my favorite moments of the process. There are always surprises, and sometimes confirmations of what I suspected during the tasting.
Only after the identities are revealed do I enter the names of the wines into my notes. I do this with the bottles and labels in front of me to ensure the data is correct. Entering the wines and checking everything usually takes me between one and two hours for a full day of tasting.
Later, once I am back home, I review the technical sheets for the wines. Whenever I taste at the Consejo Regulador, I ask the wineries to fill out a specific information sheet that I designed myself. This includes the details that I find most relevant, because technical sheets prepared by wineries often do not include the information I need.
At that stage I combine three elements: my blind tasting notes, the technical information from the wineries, and a final reflection. It is in this last step that I sometimes add contextual comments about the producer, the village, or the style of the wine. These additions are made after the wines are revealed and are intended to help place the wine within its broader context.
This process takes more time, but it is the method I have found that allows me to maintain objectivity during the tasting while also enriching the final notes with context and personal reflections. Blind tasting, for me, is the fairest way to approach wine, because all of us — and especially professional tasters — carry many biases that can influence perception.
Ferran Centelles
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Are wineries like Artadi treated on a level playing field with the wines offered by the regulators? When they broke from the DOCa in 2014 they were the renegade that inspired change in the regulations - singular wine recognition. Now there a great wine that’s part of a sea of lower quality Spanish wines. Will Lafleur no longer be included in Pomerol tastings??? Seems a bit shortsighted and contrary to encouraging innovation…
Thank you for your comment.
In this case, the tasting was proposed and organized by the Consejo Regulador, and it was a very large tasting with many samples. Because of this format and the organization of the event, the wines included were those registered within the DO. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the possibility this time to organize a parallel tasting with wines outside the appellation.
That said, I completely agree with your point. Artadi absolutely deserves all the attention and respect it receives. It is a historic project and an iconic wine that has contributed enormously to the prestige of Spanish wine.
When possible, I try to ensure that all the important players of a region are represented. For example, when I visited Bullas I spent one day with the Consejo Regulador and another day visiting producers outside the DO on my own. Something similar will happen in my upcoming tasting in Aragón, which was not organized by the DOs but prepared by the great sommelier Raúl Igual, allowing for a broader representation.
In Rioja, however, due to the number of samples and the structure of the tasting organized by the DO, this was not possible.
Thank you again for raising the point — and long live Artadi, without any doubt. It is a legendary wine that I have had the pleasure to serve and enjoy many times, and one that brings great pride and prestige to Spanish wine.
Best regards,
Ferran Centelles
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It seems a pity that most of the wines I have viewed are not available in the UK and it would be helpful to get an idea of price point without having to look up each wine individually.
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We completely agree with you on availability – it’s frustrating to read about something we’d like to try and find out we can’t get it in our particular country (or even state, here in the US…). But at the same time, when we travel, we like to know what wines we should be looking out for in that place; we’d rather be drinking the things we can’t get back home. And so in this way we think there’s great value in covering everything. (Plus, any importers who are reading these pieces might pick up some tips!)
As for prices, this is difficult both in the amount of time needed to gather the prices but also the vast differences in prices in different markets. Wine-searcher is the best answer we currently have, as it addresses all markets, though we realize that it’s an imperfect tool. We’ll continue working on ways of making pricing info more accessible, though; thank you for the gentle push.