Lydia Spencer-Elliott
ONTANON CRIANZA by Bodegas Ontanon has been voted Spain’s highest ranking wine at the 2020 Sommelier Awards in San Francisco.
Made in La Rioja, the bottle was given a gold award and 95 points in the non vintage still wine category.
With a powerful, fruity and spicy flavour, the 2016 red wine has a simultaneously broad and well balanced flavour.
With 94 points respectively, the cabernet sauvignon Pepe Yllera and grenache noir Terra Remota Camino followed closely behind.
Awarded a silver award was Conde de Artoiz Tinto by Bodegas Logos (2017). Meanwhile, the Lot 654 Rías Baixas Albariño by Cameron Hughes Wine was awarded bronze.
Spain is the number one worldwide producer of organic wine and production of the tipple has been noted down in history as early as the first century AD.
Roman poet, Ovid, noted down that the most popular wine in Rome – Spanish Saguntum – was great for getting your mistress drunk.
You can even visit an interactive museum in Teia, Alella, when archeologists discovered evidence of an ancient Roman wine press in Catalonia.
