the winemaker Manuel Carrizzoco-owner of the Badman Wines winery in Ronda, and the Australian winemaker, Yale Norristhey launched Rondahis most personal project to create a Spanish wine that alone will be sold in Australia.
For this they have chosen to create a white and a red using Rueda and Toro grapes of the Tempranillo and Verdejo varieties that have been specially selected in vineyards that Carrizosa already knew because he had worked with the wineries that manage them.
After the harvest, they were transferred to Ronda for the City of the Tagus begin the complex process of creating unique wines that must seduce a customer who is very ignorant of these grapes. That was precisely one of the objectives set: to produce wines with varieties that are not processed Australia. “There they don’t move by denominations, they talk about types of grapes, that’s why we chose those that are emblematic of Spain and that have a certain international recognition, doing it with varieties they work with and that they know very well have made no sense”, explains Carrizosa .
An idea born in Australia, the country where Carrizosa has been working since 2012 providing consultancy Islander Estate Vineyards and in which he met Norris himself, who had started collaborating with it a year earlier and of which he is currently a partner and general manager.
Now, that idea is starting to take shape and Norris himself went to Ronda to help prepare the wines that will have fermentation in cask, so he expects to get a big draw in them. Particularly particular is the system that is being adopted in the case of the red, since it was decided to put the grapes inside the barrel and macerate inside for five weeks.
To do this they also had to drill the 500-liter barrels and open a hole that would allow the grapes to enter and close it with special caps. They also devised a system to manually rotate the rods twice daily, movement necessary to facilitate the contact between skins and seeds with the must to favor the extraction of aromas and color. A job that they are carrying out at the facilities of the Huerto de la Condesa winery with which Carrizosa also provides consultancy and which has systems to control the temperature throughout the process.
After that, these wines are expected to have a year of barrel aging before reaching a high-end market where they should be sold to about $ 70 a bottle of white wine and about $ 100 a bottle of red wine.
As for the production, being an author’s wine, it will be limited to about 1,000 bottles each, being intended exclusively for the Australian market, where wineries usually have their own bar or restaurant and where you can taste their wines while eating. However, they do not rule out leaving a small item for a restaurant that may have it exclusively.
An idea that is already a reality and that is beginning to give shape to another … And they are already thinking about the possibility of producing a wine with similar characteristics, but with a representative grape of Argentina.
