I wouldn’t call myself an expert, but I definitely have a greater appreciation for Spanish wines and a wealth of knowledge to base my wine purchases around. I always enjoyed Spanish wines, and thought they were excellent value wines. However, after three days of studying and tasting Spanish wines, I have a deeper understanding of what makes these wines so special from the soil to the climate to the native grape varietals.

Yesterday was an eye-opening experience for me as the day focused on the wines of Andalusia, concentrating on sherry wines. I’ve only sampled sherry a handful of times in my life and none of them left a striking impression on me. In fact, I remember them all being powerful, overly alcoholic and extremely sweet, but not in a good way. Yesterday’s sample shed new light onto the matter and provided me with a better understanding of the entire vinification process.

One of my favorites was a Gonzales Byass’s Nectar, a Pedro Ximénez Sherry, which gives a raisiny and dried fruits nose. On the palate the Pedro Ximénez was elegant, smooth, thick and raisiny. It was sweet, but not overpowering with sugar and left a long after taste on the palate. It’s a steal at $18 for a bottle.

Sherry is a labor intensive process that should not be attempted by the faint of heart. The minimum aging for all sherry is three years. However, some sherries age 20 or even 30 years. Sherry is not vintage, rather it’s several vintages and in some cases hundreds of vintages blended together. There are several different types of sherry depending on the style you prefer. Each type of sherry is vinified separately in a solera. I’ll explain more about the solera system in a later post. I think most consumers are in the same position as I was….knowing nothing about sherry and having limited experience with the wine. I’ll do my best to share because I found it fascinating.

I learned lots of great information and tasted wonderful wines that I hope to share over the next few weeks. It’s amazing how much information can be crammed into three days. My head was getting close to overload by the end of the day yesterday. I also hope to find some of the wines we tasted for further sampling and enjoyment.