2021 Queiron 'Mi Lugar' Tempranillo Blanco, Rioja DOCa, Spain

There is no better thing than dreaming about things for these to become reality. And the fact is that Mi Lugar Tempranillo Blanco, the first white wine in the Queirón catalogue –the newest Quel bodega of the Ontañón Family- is born out of a coming together of dreams and wishes: a unique variety found nowhere else in the world, indigenous and exclusive to Rioja, an almost uncharted territory in the heart of one of the wine regions with the longest tradition on the planet, and the natural progression of the wine which started off this adventure: Queirón Ensayos Capitales Nº2 ‘Lágrima en Tinaja’, the second “movement” in the ephemeral, innovative output of this bodega which has served as the inspiration and basis for Mi Lugar Tempranillo Blanco.

The Ensayos Capitales project, a testing ground and a minefield of exciting challenges for Queirón, is based on the production of ephemeral wines which belong to the sphere of innovation, wines which are born and die with their own vintages, but which open up opportunities and shape our winery’s most innovative range. Ensayos Capitales Nº2 ‘Lágrima en Tinaja’ 2019, the second wine in the collection, was the first Queirón white wine and the pioneer of this adventure. Moreover, it is based on a very special variety, exclusive to Rioja and unique in the world: tempranillo blanco, the natural mutation of the tempranillo vine, discovered at the end of the last century in a village in the Rioja Oriental zone. We used a very unusual vinification process, with the first part of the fermentation in stainless steel vats and finishing up in the cask. And afterwards, with just the free run must, rounded off in an earthenware vessel.

Ensayos Capitales Nº2 ‘Lágrima en Tinaja’ 2019 was launched with 3,126 bottles and an exhaustive selection of grapes from the El Aniceto vineyard, a plot of sandy-loam soil on the Quel slopes of the Sierra de Yerga, at an altitude of over 600 metres. Now, thanks to the path it has opened up, Mi Lugar Tempranillo Blanco 2021 has been launched, after applying all we have learned thanks to the Ensayos Capitales project.