As part of the series of tastings themed around old vines at Barcelona Wine Week, Master Sommelier and Master of Wine, Doug Frost, tackled the question of whether the appeal of old vine wines extends beyond the romantic to the rational. To test this, the US-born expert led a blind tasting of six different wines to assess whether they truly showed greater aromatic complexity, structure, or depth than those from younger vines.
He started by posing several rhetorical questions:
- “Does an old vine make great wine because it is an old vine or is it an old vine because it made great wine so we let it grow old?”
- “Do wines from old vines taste better as the grapes are treated with more care?”
It certainly doesn’t make much sense to make simple, easy-drinking wines from old vines that produce lower yields and are often in hard-to-farm places.
As Regional Ambassador for the Old Vine Conference, I have often spoken about the theory that old vines produce smaller yields of more concentrated grapes resulting in wines with greater intensity on the palate. But what does this mean in tasting terms? Would I be able to identify wines made from old vines from those coming from younger ones?
Despite the risk to my credibility, I thought it would be interesting to share my first impressions. Please note the wines were all tasted blind with no prior information on the vintage, area, grape etc., which made it particularly challenging!
1. Vatan Nisia Verdejo Old Vines 2023, DO Rueda
My notes read: “Fresh white peach, nice touch of salinity, mineral, long. Old vines.”
I got off to a good start with this one as it immediately led me to north-west Spain, where the profile of wines from young vines (peachy, fruity, simple) tends to be quite distinct from that from old vines, which I find show more of that stony, mineral depth.
In this case, the wine comes from mainly ungrafted vines grown on sandy soils planted between 1900 and 1988.
2. Envínate Palo Blanco 2023, DO Ycoden-Daute-Isora, Tenerife
“Volatile, smoky, clayey notes - tinaja? Savoury, tomato leaf, ripe apple, lime, nice freshness. Young vines?”
The only thing you can be sure of when blind tasting wine is that you can’t be sure of anything. My immediate thought was that Doug was trying to trick us by showing a wine from young vines that had been aged in amphorae. A reminder not to overthink things when blind tasting and to concentrate on what is in the glass. I should have associated the smoky notes and textural character with the volcanic soil of Tenerife, and very old vines of 100+ years of age. The wine was fermented in concrete tanks and aged for 10 months in oak foudres.
3. López de Heredia Viña Tondonia Reserva 2012, DOCa Rioja
“Garnet in colour, savoury red fruit, toasted oak. Elegant depth and length. Tempranillo? Old vines?”
This is, of course, a wine that shows the classic style of Rioja, where the focus is much more on long oak ageing than fruit concentration. But wines created for long ageing often draw on older parcels for added structure and the ability to evolve over years. The Viña Tondonia vineyard was first established between 1913 - 1914 but parts have been replanted since then, so the vines are both young and old.
4. Frontonio Supersónico Garnacha 2022, IGP Valdejalón
“Pale ruby. Floral, strawberry, light-bodied, slightly grippy tannins, fine freshness. Garnacha. Young vines?”
Another difficult wine to call due to the style. Fernando Mora MW tends to pick his grapes as early as possible to retain the acidity and crunchy red fruit. In fact, the vines are over 80 years of age, mainly Garnacha with a little Macabeo. The age of the vines is more evident in the length than the breadth of this lean, ethereal Garnacha.
5. Tinto Pesquera Reserva 2020, DO Ribera del Duero
“Black fruit, blue fruit, chocolatey oak. Fruit forward, powdery tannins, grippy finish. Mixed age?”
The fruit-forward nature of the wine made me suspect there were some younger vines in the blend. In fact, it is quite common for DO Ribera del Duero wines to be made from a blend of vines of different ages - young vines to give vibrant fruit particularly for the younger unoaked, Roble styles and then more tannic, concentrated grapes from old vines for long ageing styles. In this case, the Pesquera vines were planted back in 1975 so at 50 years they now classify as old, although not as old as many of the vines in the region.
6. Numanthia 2019, DO Toro
“Concentrated red fruit, incense and dark notes at the core. Deep, tannic and very long and elegant. Priorat? Old Vines.”
In this case, the concentration and length made it easy to associate with old vines, but I misidentified the region due to the elegance and ripeness of the tannins. Numanthia blends fruit from across the DO Toro for greater complexity, including higher elevation vines in the south-west and some very old parcels, giving a more balanced style. In this case, the average age of the vines is 80 years.
Not easy to call
Frost asked us to raise our hands and say whether we thought each wine was from young or old vines, and very few of us were brave enough to make the call. As you can see from my notes, those of us who did were only correct about half the time.
He believes that the age of the vines cannot be identified immediately when tasting, but is more to do with the depth and length on the palate. It is certainly easier with the more tannic wines, whereas I was flummoxed by the fresher styles of the Envínate white from Tenerife and Fernando Mora’s Garnacha. The effects of winemaking and ageing made it even more complicated.
Next time, I’d sit for longer with the wines before making any decisions and concentrate on both the length and the breadth on the palate. I certainly think it would have been easier if there had been some examples from young vines to compare.
Old vines: important for more than their taste
As far as sales messaging goes, old vines are invaluable, said Frost. He still works the floor as a sommelier and explained that customers can’t resist opting for a wine if they’re told it comes from vines that have been in the ground for a hundred years or more.
He summed up by saying: “In social, economic and historic terms, old vines are critically important. But from a tasting standpoint, I’m not so sure. If someone tells you they can tell the difference between wines made from old and young vines, it’s bullshit.”
One thing that is certain is that all the wines we tasted were from grapes made from at least a proportion of old vines according to the OIV classification (35+ years) and there wasn’t a dud among them, so I think that the claim that old vines can make great wines when grown in the right place and with careful winemaking still holds up.
For those who require more concrete evidence, a study conducted by the DO Campo de Borja in conjunction with the University of Zaragoza aims to provide a scientific response to the question of how vine age affects ageing capacity and flavour development. The findings are due to be released this autumn.
Author
Anna Harris-Noble
A wine marketing professional with more than 20 years' experience in the UK and Spain, she holds a WSET Diploma and works as a consultant, freelance writer and translator. She has been Regional Ambassador for Spain for the Old Vine Conference since 2022.
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