Numerous interesting wines were presented at a workshop organized by the Spanish Embassy and the ICEX Foreign Trade Institute.
After Italy and France, Spain is the third country in the world to produce wine. According to the OIV (International Organization for Wine and Wine), Spain will produce in 2018 from a million and one hundred thousand hectares of vineyards 40.9 million hl of wine. The Spaniards have 70 descriptors of protected origin (DO = Denominacion de origen) and (DOCa = Denominacion de origen calificada) and 41 geographical protected vineyards (IPG) such as Rueda blanco (verdejo), Ribera del Duero, Rioja tinto (tempranillo and garnacha), Penedes quarry (xarello, macabeo, parellada), Jerez sherry (pedro ximenez), Montilla Moriles Cordoba (type of sherry).
At the Westin Hotel in Zagreb many sparkling wines and sherry wines were presented. The wines were from various areas, from Catalonia to Galicia. There are 10 sparkling wines from the Castilla la Mancha area, Rueda and Cava. Two low-alcohol cocktails were also served. Among the sparkling wines there were also two wines made by the winemaking method of Felix Solis Avantis, which is imported by the wine shop Vrutak, known for imports of Spanish sparkling wines and sherry Martinez Bujanda groups (wineries Finca Antiqua, Finca Bujanda, Finca Valpiedra and Cosecheros Y Criadores) and winemakers Felix Callejo and Gonzalez Byass .
The so-called fortified wine, a sherry group (D.O. Jerez), was presented. This is wine made by the soler method, when the barrels are being routed in several strings and wines from the upper barrels are pushed in the barrels below. There were also wines from the palomino and pedro ximenez varieties, as well as moscato from Rueda, Montilla-Moriles, Manzanilla, Cava and Jerez.
For the end of the presentation, the Don PX Convento seleccion of 1958 was chosen, DO Montilla Moriles, from the sorbus Pedro Ximenez, with 17.5 vol% of alcohol with the remaining 407 g / lit, Bodegas Toro Albala Star, whose representative, Mrs Claudia Asencio Venegas, also talked about this wine on promotion at Westin. In 1958, 14,200 bottles were produced and the remaining bottles were sold at 126,55 euros. The wine is old but it is still lively. Grapes were dried in the sun. The wine has a tertiary bouquet of candied fruit flavours, it feels like ginger, chocolate, caramel and pepper. Mineral and sweetness and preserved acid give the liveliness of that wine.
The workshop was run by the wine publicist Saša Špiranec.