In 2000, the Castaño family acquired and re-organized some old vineyards located at the lowest part of Sierra Salinas, between the provinces of Murcia and Alicante and decided to have a winery built there. The winery is a state of the art, gravity flow facility on the mountains’ foothills at about 650 meters above sea level.  Their goal was to take advantage of the amazing quality Monastrell (Mourvedre) grapes that grow throughout the region.  This wine comes only from the 52 hectares of vineyards planted around the winery.

The soils consist of limestone in the highest parts of the valley with stripes of clay in the bottom part. Different viticulture is carried out in both areas and the resulting grapes are vinified and aged  separately to create more complexity in the end of the process.  After blending, the wine is aged for 4 months in French oak barrels to soften, and add a hint of spicy oak flavor.

This wine consists of mostly Monastrell, with small portions of Garnacha (Grenache), Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah.  It’s big, dark, and rich, but has an admirable balance that serves it very well.  This is a wine for moderately spicy foods that have lots of fat, think carnitas, or Texas style beef brisket, but it’s also a great wine for all hard to semi-soft cheeses, and a great wine to drink with a movie after dinner (it’s just tasty, and it doesn’t require food).  Drink this now -2011

Follow this link to a great map of Spain that you can download