Garmón, Ribera del Duero (Castilla y León, Spain) 2014

This is the first release of this wine, which is a new project launched by the Garcia family (led by Mariano, Eduardo and Alberto), which sits atop the winemaking hierarchy in Spain with only the Palacios family within sight.  A plan to build a dedicated winery for the project is in the works, but for now, there’s no doubting that this is an ultra-serious wine, as demonstrated by its very dense pigmentation, expressive aromatics, concentrated body, intense oak signature and very persistent finish.  Although another five years of cellaring will be required for this to fully unfold, it already shows excellent purity of fruit (Ribera del Duero’s particular strength with Tempranillo) even under a lot of assertive wood notes, and shows lots of little nuances after sufficient airing.  Indeed, the wine was notably more complex rather than fading when re-tasted the day after opening, which is invariably a sign of excellent and as close to a guarantee of age-worthiness as one can find.  Certainly this can be enjoyed today with robust foods like grilled lamb, but this was built to bloom fully in 5-10 years.  Stay tuned…this will likely develop from an excellent to a great wine in years to come, and will also likely to be the first in a string of superb wines under this label.