Bodegas Ximénez Spínola, PX Solera 1918, Jerez, Spain

Producer Profile

There are not many wineries that have built their success by focusing on just one grape variety, let alone one that has been permanently out of fashion, but that is precisely what Bodegas Ximénez-Spínola have done since 1729.

Working solely with Pedro Ximénez, they produce a selection of fascinating dry wine, dessert wine and sherry. However, there are not many wineries with such immense history and deep knowledge of Pedro Ximénez either, making them true masters of the grape and producer of some truly exceptional wines.

Viticulture

Once cut, the grapes spend no less than 21 days exposed to the sun, which dehydrates them slowly and progressively, concentrating the sugars and providing an elegant natural sweetness. Since the “sun-drying" causes the grapes to dehydrate, for every ton of fresh grapes only 300 kg of raisined grapes are obtained, which generates about 100 kg of waste (skin, stalks, seeds) and 200 litres of must.

Winemaking

It is aged in the family Solera from a blend of musts since 1918. Clarified by decanting from the barrel into the bottle through a soft cellulose filter. For its quality and scarcity, it is consider a "cult wine". The winery releases less than half of the annual quota assigned by the Regulatory Council.

Oak Ageing

Time: Solera system since 1918
Type: American
% wine oaked: 100
% new oak: None

Tasting Note

An intense mahogany colour, intense raisin aromas and notes of roasted coffee and black chocolate. The palate is dominated by the raisined grapes with hints of dried fig. The concentrated fruit is perfectly assembled with the delicate roasted wood notes leaving an almost endless aftertaste and a hard to forget experience

Food Matching

Being intensely sweet this needs just as intense flavours in the food and works best with desserts such as cardamom rice pudding with honey and cumin glazed figs.

Awards

Jancis Robinson 17.5 Points
Deep golden brown. Saturated raisins, rich and sultry. Nutty caramel intensity. Endlessly long. Not quite as viscous as the 2014 but still rich and thick. This has much more dark-toffee and dried-fruit intensity and is more complex, with darker savoury notes on the finish even though it is intensely sweet. Gorgeous burnt caramel aftertaste and still a note of bitter orange. Gloriously hedonistic. 15%, 17.5 Points, JH, April 2017.