Abel Mendoza 5V Rioja 2021

2021 5V 96WA
Abel Mendoza
San Vicente, Rioja

95+ pts Wine Advocate
(highest ever for this wine from them)

The white with more complexity and nuance is the 2021 5V. It's a blend of five varieties, hence the name, but in 2021 the blend is slightly different, with more Garnacha Blanca and Viura; the breakdown is 30% Viura, 30% Garnacha Blanca, 20% Tempranillo Blanco, 10% Malvasía and 10% Torrontés. It has very good ripeness and aromatic complexity but with subtleness and elegance. It has more complexity and somehow feels more open and expressive than any of the other whites. This matured in barrel with the lees and bâtonnage for five months. It has 14% alcohol, a pH of 3.3 and 5.7 grams of acidity (measured in tartaric acid per liter). 4,116 bottles produced. It was bottled in April 2022.

Abel Mendoza has very high hopes for the wines from 2021. He told me he hasn't seen a vintage like it for a long time—healthy grapes and a lack of issues, some hail in one plot, harvest from the end of September. He then said it's the best vintage since 2010, but better than 2010, with more freshness and acidity. The whites could very well be the finest collection to date.

Most of the reds were from 2018, a challenging and cool vintage that produced lows and highs, but some very high highs... The 2018 collection is also the finest group of reds I have seen here. On average, he produces 80,000 bottles. The finest 80,000 bottles they have produced so far...

-Luis Gutierrez, Robert Parker Wine Advocate

When creating the blend, the proportions are decided based on quality and quantity. Their philosophy is not one of taking the best fruit for the blend or for the single-varietals. Rather, the decision is made on desired characteristics and what they are looking to show in the wines. Structure, acid, fruit, aromatics etc. Sometimes the blend is done at the juice stage (if the vintage has allowed for similar ripening times) and sometimes the blend is done after fermentation. Similar to the single-varietals, the wine spends 5 - 6 months in new French oak barrels. - Importer

• 73% Viura, Garnacha blanca, Torrontés, Tempranillo blanco and Malvasía blanca make up the balance
• The fruit is sorted and pressed in a pneumatic press. The juice goes into tank for a brief settling period and after one day is racked off into barrels for fermentation.
• Depending on the vintage blending can happen before fermentation, after, or both if one or more varieties are separated.  
• After fermentation, the wines stay in barrel for 5 - 6 months on the lees with intermittent batonnage.