Touring Andalucia
Tasted March 24, 2016 - April 2, 2016 by DK Amateur with 352 views
Introduction
This trip took us from Malaga over Baeza and Aracena to Sevilla, Jerez and Sanlúcar de Barrameda, bringing us through the olive country in Jaén, the Jabugo ham dehesa and the sherry district. A gastronomic highlight was the dinner at ** Aponiente. I am afraid that my notes are somewhat sloppy or even non-existent; and this is why I have added som explanations to retain a memory of what we had.
Flight 1 - Miscellaneous (7 notes)
We had a number of good meals, not always accompanied by wine.
Flight 2 - Aponiente restaurant (3 notes)
Angel Leon's 2 star restaurant Aponiente in El Puerto de Santa Maria is possibly the most extreme fish restaurant in the world. Nearly everything served (except for bread, butter and olive oil) comes from the sea, and he seems to favour a deep and intense fish taste. We had the 20+ course meal called "Mar de Leva" and chose the accompanying wine menu which consisted of 80 % sherry. I only have proper notes on a few of the 12 wines which tended to be out of the ordinary and included many of the new (to me) category of "en rama" sherries, i.e. wines which are bottled unfiltered and thus tend to be more unstable (apparently they don't travel) and possibly richer. Among the other noteworthy drinks were Lustau's delicious vermouth produced on a sherry basis, a champagne from J.-M. Séleque, and a magnificent more than 50 years old palo cortado from Gutíerrez Colosía which was even more aromatic and wild than the Cruz Vieja amontillado; it was served after the Cruz Vieja amontillado and was followed by what appeared to be a special bottling of Hidalgo's oloroso en rama VORS "El Faraón", which had phenomenal notes of orange and smoke in a taut style.
Flight 3 - Two bodega visits (4 notes)
We visited Lustau in Jerez and Barbadillo in Sanlúcar and tasted 9-10 wines in each winery. My notes from Lustau diverge somewhat from what I wrote about the same wines at a sherry dinner in Denmark in June 2014. All wines were good and only the highlights are noted here.