When 39-year-old Bernardo Ortega started to make wine in Villarrobledo (Albacete), his father's hometown, there was only one other person using the traditional tinajas (earthenware jars) that brought fame over the centuries to this village in La Mancha.
A visit to the Centro de Interpretación de la Alfarería Tinajera (Earthenware Pottery Interpretation Centre) provides an insight into its glorious past, starting with the five types of clay present in the subsoil of Villarrobledo that enabled the production of leakproof vessels capable of handling fermentation. Demand for tinajas peaked when phylloxera reached France in the second half of the 19th century, but there were more than 70 furnaces producing some 8,000 tinajas a year at the end of the 1950s.
The picture below shows a handful of large earthenware jars (they could hold up to 8,000 litres) in an old cellar in La Mancha. The building is now derelict and its roof partially collapsed, but it provides a glimpse of the crucial role that tinajas played in the production of wine in the region.
This craft is now almost extinct. Bernardo has managed to get hold of some vessels from Juan Padilla, the village's last leading artisan tinaja-maker who retired recently. Padilla, about whom we will write in detail soon, made tinajas for renowned producers both in Spain and abroad.
Tinajas bring a distinct personality to Ortega's wines, as do traditional vineyards, local grape varieties and the ancestral winemaking techniques he combines with a 21st century approach. He shares a renewed vision of Castilla-La Mancha with other producers like Verum, Garage Wine or Recuero, who are all committed to expressing an identity that appeals to the region’s culture and traditions.
Although born in Zaragoza and living later in Milan and Albacete, Bernardo has always stayed close to Villarrobledo. Perhaps out of nostalgia for the vineyards that his family once owned, which were eventually uprooted, he pursued a career in wine. After studying at the Escuela de la Vid in Requena and completing a degree in oenology in Tarragona, his work took him to wildly different places.
In Castilla-La Mancha he worked for Señorío de los Llanos (DO Valdepeñas), for the Villarrobledo cooperative rented by the García Carrión group, and for a private French-owned winery that remained thoroughly French in its philosophy and the grape varieties they used. During this time, he witnessed the uprooting of old vineyards and the way in which growers seek a more comfortable life for their children, away from the countryside. "People move from farming to construction without any professional training," Ortega laments. "I got into wine because I cared deeply about the land".
Production structures in Castilla-La Mancha have undergone a radical transformation as cooperatives have generally absorbed wine production in the area. According to the Centro de Interpretación de la Alfarería Tinajera, at the beginning of the 20th century there were 200 family-run bodegas in Villarrobledo alone; now barely a dozen cooperatives and private business remain.
"Cooperatives have changed the wine market and old vineyards have lost their value," Bernardo points out. You only have to put yourself in the shoes of a grower who is paid between €0.16 and €0.20 for a kilo of Airén. " Under these conditions, I would also grub up the old vines to plant trellises," he says.
The picture is quite different in Rioja, where, from 2013 to 2014, Bernardo was Basilio Izquierdo's right-hand man. A restless character, Izquierdo is a highly respected winemaker in the region after his long stint as head winemaker at Cvne. Working since the mid-2000s in a cramped winery in Laguardia, Izquierdo moves with ease from relatively classic Rioja wines to offbeat styles such as orange cuvées, sparkling blanc de noirs and whites under flor. With such a background in Spain's most famous wine region, very few know that Izquierdo was born in Socuéllamos (Ciudad Real). In fact, it was Basilio Izquierdo who told Bernardo about the layer of yeasts (flor) in his grandfather's vats and who inspired him. "He had an outsider’s point of view, but he was also knowledgeable about the area and its worth,” Ortega adds.
"The truth is that not only in La Mancha, but all over Spain, the veils of yeasts are removed so that the wines don't get spoiled. I had to take the risk with my own wines because I couldn't do it anywhere else. But I have been to Jerez frequently to visit Willy Pérez and Ramiro Ibáñez, as well as Gramona in Penedès and I have also talked at length with Juan Padilla. I also really like the wines of the Jura," Bernardo explains.
Ortega made his debut in the 2017 vintage working with the grape varieties of his homeland: Airén from La Mancha and Bobal from Quintanar del Rey, in the nearby DO Manchuela, where grapes ripen according to his requirements thanks to the higher elevation. In 2017 he also produced a Tempranillo, but the old vineyard he sourced grapes from was uprooted and he has not made further attempts with this variety. He sells his wines under the brand Simbiosis.
Old Airén is the cornerstone of his project. Surrounded by high-yielding plots, El Gacho is a true survivor in Villarrobledo. Planted with 80-year-old ungrafted Airén on stony soils, this plot occupies just 1.4 ha of land. At the end of September, the grape skins still felt firm and the pulp was starting to taste sweet. Ortega approaches the variety in a myriad of ways. While a small part is fermented in stainless steel tanks, other bunches undergo skin-contact or rest in tinajas under a veil of yeasts.
It is really interesting to taste all of these versions of Airén separately to see how much each of them contributes to the final blend of Simbiosis. Whilst the skin-contact batch provides backbone, the stainless steel part transmits the terroir’s direct, saline expression and the one aged under flor provides the floral, yeasty touch.
"I want to show the many wonderful qualities of our land and Airén is one of them: a grape variety that can produce both young and premium wines and can also be distilled into holandas (spirits with a strength of below 70% vol to make brandy). You can say that a grape variety is truly great when it is able to provide multiple nuances", Bernardo points out.
His Flor de Airén is aged in amontillado casks for three years under a veil of yeasts plus an additional year of oxidative ageing. A 50 cl. bottle of this limited production wine retails at around €30 and offers Sherry-like complexity from a grape variety that shares the neutral character of Palomino in Jerez. Here, the salty notes from the flor blend with the sapid nuances provided by the local terroir and the very old vines.
Ortega has also tried his hand at making a traditional method sparkling wine by blending Xarel.lo from Penedès with Hondarrabi Zuri from txakoli country (the Hondarrabi Zuri bubbly produced by Basilio Izquierdo inspired him). For its dosage, he used a 50-year-old Oloroso made from Airén and aged in oak barrels. Xarel.lo adds body, Hondarrabi Zuri is acidity and Airén brings the local flavour into the bottle. The logistics were so challenging that in the future he intends to source grapes from less distant vineyards, providing he can get the required acidity.
His range of wines also includes a red Bobal sourced from a friend's plot in Quintanar del Rey (Cuenca). It has the kind of terroir Ortega is interested in: ungrafted old vines planted on stony soils with limestone. Aged in oak and clay jars, it is a fresh, enjoyable red retaining the complexity and depth provided by the old vines. Both this and the Simbiosis white are characterful, enjoyable wines retailing at around €12 in Spain which, most importantly, secure the viability of the vineyards they come from.
The brand Simbiosis is not a random choice. Bernardo Ortega envisages the association of animal or plant individuals of various species as part of his philosophy. He views it across the wine-making process, from vineyards (the plants’ ecosystem, micro-organisms) to winemaking (the microbiology of fermentation and yeasts), but also in his dealings with people in his daily life. "My vision of the world revolves around this idea; I believe in encouraging the strengths of each individual and fostering all kinds of connections," he says.
The one thing there is no doubt about is that both Simbiosis and the sophisticated Flor de Airén are setting new horizons in a region that desperately needs to send attractive and inspiring messages to the world.
