Mencía 2005 Luna Beberide, Bierzo
24th October 2007
I have been brooding on the question of wine and national character. One must reflect the other, but how, exactly? This seems impossible to nail down. For example, Americans like powerful wines with concentrated fruit flavours. They also like baseball, SUVs and hot dogs. Is there a common factor? I really cannot see one. Yet all these things are expressions of the same national taste.
The problem is even worse with Spain. As everyone knows, this country has lately been transformed. Once it was a nation of sleepy, backward, blatantly corrupt, Roman Catholic bigots. Now it is a nation of hyperactive, ultra-modern, discreetly corrupt, left-wing neurotics. We would expect this transformation to be somehow reflected in the country’s wine, would we not?
And to be sure, over the same period Spanish wine has changed. They do still make those big old-fashioned Riojas and Ribera del Dueros, so heavily oaked they taste like liquefied barrels. But in recent years they have also begun to make very different, modern wines, and this is one of them.
Think of Spain as a giant T-shirt and you will find Bierzo in the left armpit. It is not one of the traditional winemaking regions. It only received its Denominación Origen in 1989, and in 2000 it still boasted a mere twenty wineries. Today there are fifty, and ten more will soon be opening. The main reason for this has been the success of Luna Beberide.
Bernardo Luna founded the winery in the mid 1980s. His first wines were evenly-proportioned blends of Cabernet, Merlot and the local Mencía grape, but in time he saw that Mencía would perform perfectly well with minimal adulteration. It is fermented in stainless steel vats, fined with egg whites and bottled unfiltered.
The wine is a deep ruby colour, soft and medium-bodied. Its nose suggests prunes and fig trees; its flavours are of blackberry and bitter cherry. It has been made with a sure touch: clean-tasting, balanced and distinctive. The 2005 costs around $13 in the US, £9 in the UK.
It seems just the wine to represent contemporary Spain. Yet it is in no way redolent of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero or Alejandro Amenábar, just as Marqués de Riscal carries no suggestion of General Franco or the Catholic Church. (And thank heaven for that.) So how should we relate wine to national character? What is the connection? Someone must have an answer, surely?
