Bodegas Comenge, Ribera del Duero (Castilla y León, Spain) 2017

 This bodega is doing very interesting work with yeast strains, isolating the best ones from their vineyard sites and then propagating them and inoculating fermentation vessels to enable the best yeasts to “outrun” the less desirable ones blowing around at random in the region.  The wines are quite good, and though I can’t precisely attribute a measure of quality to this yeast program, it is undoubtedly impressive that such efforts are underway at Comenge.  This wine includes 10% Cabernet and was inaugurated in 2004, a year when particularly good Cab was harvested.  It undergoes 18 to 24 months of aging in all new French oak, and though the wood influence definitely shows, the spice and vanilla notes are nicely supported by rich fruit.  This is too “international” in style to serve as a good introduction to Ribera del Duero, but that doesn’t diminish the fact that it is a very good wine.  Beware, though, that this is still very firm and has lots of wood tannin, so don’t crack into this for another five years.