Canary Islands

I had a research meeting the other night.  While this entails meeting with my research partners and talking about p values, regression analysis and variables, it also generally involves delicious food and drinking.

We met at a tapas place in Temescal that I've not had great success with on the past several tries.  The wine list, of course mostly Spanish, is fun and quite good, but the food hasn't wowed me.  This time, I had a completely different experience and I don't think it was the wine talking...

The food was fantastic, I'm guessing the menu is just been large enough that I've gotten rather unlucky in what I've chosen to try.  Ginny suggested a wine she loves- from the Canary Islands.  We got a bottle and I have to say, it was one of the most unusual wines I have ever tasted.  My tasting notes said "Ash" "Acid" and "Structured tannin" but the ash was what really hit me on the nose.  Unmistakeable and very much a signature.

The Canaries are seven small Spanish islands situated just over 50 miles off the coast of Africa, in the Atlantic ocean.  They are volcanic, and a very strange place to grow wine.  Each of the vines need to be grown in a hole, protected from the elements, and often on steep, carved terraces and all in volcanic soil.  Consequently, they taste just like their sea-salted leaves and dark, smoky soil.  I remember tasting a cab from up in northern CA at a tiny vineyard when that vintage had been grown during pervasive wildfires that were plaguing the Sierras and the smoke was intense and hit you right up front.  Different from that, these wines offer the distant memory of smoke embedded inside of something much more complex but when you say the word "volcanic" you can't help but think "that's exactly it!"

Canary Island wines were almost impossible to find here in north america, but they are creeping in slowly and getting snapped up fast thanks to some easing of distribution.  If you ever find yourself able to try one, you're in for something quite unexpected.
Cheers.