'Camiño Real' Mencía de Amandi 2019

This is the estate blend of Guímaro’s soils in the Amandi zone, this time with a little oak ageing. Summing six hectares, it’s effectively a field blend, about 85% old vine Mencía co-picked with Merenzao, Mouratón, Brancellao, Caiño, Sousón, and Alicante Bouschet. Like the Joven, it sums slate, granite, quartz and sand. Hand-picked fruit (40% whole bunches) spontaneously ferments in open old oak vats for 40 days. Half the wine spends seven months in old French oak vats followed by four months in old barricas, the other half swaps vessels and ageing ratios. Bottled unfiltered, unfined. Camiño is the Galego variant of Camino in Castellano – its name is thus ‘The Royal Way’.

Compared to its unwooded little sister, this is a little deeper and more bold, but still below mid-weight. It starts in a red fruit spectrum, but there’s darkness in the depths. Pomegranate, sour cherry, smoked thyme, forest bracken, mace, pepper pods. Typical to Guímaro wines, it has a lovely agridulce (sweet-sour) pulse. There’s some red earth as well as typical slatey mineral, and a waft of game, which deepens with time in the bottle. Classical Guímaro in its round, open presentation and structural harmony and delicate acid persistence. Pin-bone tannin organises brambly purple fruit with a hint of smoked berry towards a lip-smacking finish studded with aromatic bitters.