Raúl Pérez, Spain’s best-known oenologist!
His 2 most unknown crus in one pack.
Raúl is of course best known for his Ultreia wines, with which he consistently achieves sky-high scores.
He is undeniably Spain’s best-known oenologist and put Bierzo and the Mencía grape on the map.
And his fame is only just beginning. A full-fledged Netflix series about him and his work is coming soon(!).
The upside is that everyone loves Raúl’s style: his wines are charming, terroir-driven and mineral, yet full and rounded, and always with that touch of originality.
The downside is that his way of working, the Burgundian way — vinifying by single plots — means there are tiny parcels that sometimes fly under the radar simply because they’re so small that no one knows them…
We happen to have two such parcels, which we’ve only been able to pour once (last year at our Exclusive Year-End Tasting), and which remain completely unknown to most of our audience.
One of them has never even been described or scored…
What’s more, production is so limited that it doesn’t even make sense to present them at tastings. We have only 60 bottles of each.
To still give you the chance to taste these lesser-known gems, we’ve put together a pack of the 2 most confidential wines by Raúl Pérez.
One of them was already scored in 2021, and it was quite something 😉:
Ultreia Paluezas: 97/100
“The Ultreia bottling that called my attention from the moment the wines were poured is the 2021 Ultreia Paluezas. I've only tasted a couple of vintages of this before, but Raúl Pérez remembers that it has called my attention every time. The distinct feature here is that the plot has limestone soils, which are very rare in Bierzo, and the majority of the place is on slate soils. So, this has the special finesse and elegance of the limestone, and it's perfumed and elegant and has a velvety palate with very fine, chalky tannins. This is now more Burgundian than Rhône, from a cool year with very perfumed reds. This is from only 0.4 hectares or so, and it even has a small part with Palomino; he produces one 225-liter barrel and a 500-liter one.”
Ultreia El Agro, however, has never been described.
Paluezas is already a small plot, but El Agro is even more limited.
It lies next to El Val, overlooking Raúl’s own house. It’s mostly sandy soils on a tiny plot of barely 0.2 ha.
Here you’ll find some of the oldest Mencía vines on poor, sandy soils.
Charming and mineral — the two keywords for this El Agro.
We’ve put them into a neat “Raúl unknown” pack so you can purchase 3 bottles of each.
And do it before they get written up or scored into the stratosphere. Don’t say I didn’t warn you… 😉
Raúl Unknown pack
3 x Raúl Pérez, Ultreia El Agro 2022
3 x Raúl Pérez, Ultreia Paluezas 2022
(Price per bottle: 57,17&eur;)
Only 20 packs available!!