Viña El Pisón...maybe the best red wine from Spain...

Then, I will translate a reflection of a good friend of mine about some great Spanish wines.

They are very important wines, so much so that they are perhaps the best wines in Spain and the depth of his reflection is not easy for me to translate, because I would need a much higher level of English than I have. Even so I will try to be as faithful as possible to the intention of his text.

This man is the one who knows most about these wines worldwide, along with its own author, Juan Carlos López de Lacalle. He knows them in depth, more than any other person on the planet.

At the end of his reflection, he comments on a wine he shared a few months ago with a good friend of his: Viña El Pisón 2004 Magnum. That friend is me. It was our farewell, just before my trip to Canada. There were three of us, all with experience in tasting the best wines in the world and the three of us said the same thing: it is probably the best Spanish wine in history (with the permission of some old Jerez, someone said).

I remember, eight years ago, I felt the same when I tasted the 2004 vintage of this wine. We were tasting several vintages of Viña El Pison, like 1995, 1998, 2001, 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007 (not bad, right?) and all of them were wonderful wines. We were several friends among the author, Juan Carlos, Blas and others. When you are in between of these kind of masters, the best thing you can do is shut up, listen, and learn. And then, suddenly, Juan Carlos became very serious and said: this wine is "catedralicio". It means like a Cathedral, like a historical monument, when he tasted the 2004. In this moment you realize that you are on the right track, because I was thinking exactly the same...in other words, I was thinking… we are tasting some of the best wines of the world. The 2007 is too young, but very interesting, the 2006 is the most "easy to drink" right now, because this vintage works in that way. The 2005 is an explosion of fruit and magical intensity. The 2001 is the "eternal youth". The 98 and 95 are the charm of maturity...all of them wonderful, but when I tasted the 2004, it appears like if the other wines were "less serious", and when a wine, in between giants, can do that, this wine is really special.

We are in the top range, they are expensive wines, but they may be the cheapest you can find in their category. If these wines were from Burgundy or Bordeaux, they would cost at least ten times more.

I leave you with my mentor, Blas Cerón, and his magnificent reflection on three wonderful wines, energy and life itself ...

VIÑA EL PISÓN, pure energy

8 years ago, I wrote a small text about Viña El Pisón, for me one of the best wines in the world. Although in recent years everything evolves very fast, today I continue believing and feeling the same thing I wrote, and I feel like sharing it with you.

It was about the energy can have and transmit a wine. I am convinced by own experience, that Viña El Pisón is one of those few extraordinary wines (something similar it happened to me with Yquem and with Krug Clos de Mesnil) who comes close to us, and we approach him, and without realizing it we approach ourselves. Emotions we allow you to appreciate and enjoy thousands of tiny details that make a wine unique, or a person, among millions. Energy, unconscious and in continuous motion, is more complex.

Friends, wines, smells, sounds ... that unwittingly change our lives, transmitters of energy, which we receive, we can assimilate, and perhaps we will project it again to other places and other people.

On this occasion I have added three comments, personal tasting notes, about 2009, 2005 and 2004 vintages. I have chosen to focus on the three best vintages that have between
10 and 20 years, a moment of its evolution that the wines are in full plenitude. I am
aware that we left out other great vintages, some younger (like the 2016, 2015, 2014 and 2010) and more mature ones (such as 1998 and 1995).

It might seem bold to say that Viña El Pisón is the best value for money wine from Spain. And not so much because it is the Spanish wine that gets the best scores in all national and international guides, but because there are no wines that we offer their quality level in their price range. When all experts think the same should not be wrong.

What attracts us of Viña El Pisón? It is irresistible, and the mind, even if I try, does not has the capacity to oppose and claudically placidly. And something begins that happens with very few wines, more common in other artistic works, the interconnection of our mind and wine. A game, the game of life, feeling, appreciating and enjoying with energy.

And I do not speak of grandiloquent Exxon Mobil or Chevron type energy, but of energy more
simple and authentic, which allows us to be happy in our daily lives, to live with those we want,  to work on what we like, have good friends, etc.

But, can a wine have its own energy? Of course. In spring the mustard is born in Rioja field, and while in the neighboring vineyards its very fine stems barely grow 15-20 centimeters, in El Pisón easily exceeds 90-100 centimeters. In Viña El Pisón, as in any great wine, the quality is
intimately linked to the variables (temperature, rainfall, sunstroke ...) of each vintage, but the character always depends exclusively on the ground. The energy is in the earth, as it is inside our brain, and today we continue ignoring the real functioning and the potential of one and the other.

And so that all the Earth's energy can be expressed in the wine it is necessary that one person makes it possible. It often happens that there is energy but there is no transmission medium. But this time we are lucky that Juan Carlos López de Lacalle exists and Viña El Pisón is his vineyard, the deepest essence of his lifetime. Juan Carlos is the guardian of El Pisón, he received it from his grandparents and parents, and he will deliver to your children. And it will go down in history, like other great artists, for revolutionize the current status, offering something as new as unique and irresistible, a wine that transmits all the energy of a vineyard so that all fans can feel it, appreciate it and enjoy it.

What is Viña El Pisón like? On the nose we enjoy what many call the "Pisón perfume", a great captivating and intoxicating aroma that gradually takes over your state of courage, relaxes you, conveys feelings of tranquility and well-being. In the mouth it is very fresh, fluid and light, while full and forceful, with a balanced and precise heartburn, which invites you to drink and drink without rest. And the best is his memory, and I don't refer to the flows that the supposed experts like so much, but to the memory that it remains in our mind after drinking a bottle.

 And then, if we achieve the perfect coupling between its huge energy and our strangers
neurons-Viña-El-Pisón-can-change-your-life.

We can say a thousand more things about El Pisón. What is the perfect union between reflection and pleasure, between elegance and forcefulness, not forgetting its subtlety, complexity, balance, beauty, finesse, harmony, etc. And his longevity is always young, like when Miguel Delibes or Francisco Ayala summed up in a few words the whole experience of their 100 years of life. A wine to dream, to fly, to be happy.

But there is something else. El Pisón is a wine to live. Because to live fully we need energy and El Pisón is pure energy.

VIÑA EL PISON 2009

2009 was a bright year. Regardless of whether it was a more or less classic vintage,
understanding as such that it approaches the average climatic values, with some strategic
and fundamental rains in early September, after a dry summer that allowed the perfect ripening of the grape. But I want to highlight the light. Because light is life, and it is the main reason why thousands of Central Europeans and Nordics abandon their rich countries and migrate to the more modest South. I am convinced that the light, just like it affects people, it also affects other living beings. Including strains of the ram. The light has no color, no smell, no taste, no touch ... but our body, and about our whole mind feels it and makes us happier and happier. I don't know very well how to call it, it may simply be light, but I believe that it is above all energy.

Viña el Pisón 2009, next to 2004, are the best wines of the 79 years of life of this vineyard.

This already puts us on high alert, as if it were a nuclear bomb drill. this quality level is only explained by the convergence of thousands of small details, of all type, which individually would not have great significance, but together intensify their qualities by one hundred thousand. It is a wine in full plenitude, and I do not mean optimal moment of consumption, but always, regardless of the time factor, is in fullness. The fullness of the three years, the fullness of the five years, the fullness of the fifteen years ... absolute fullness.

Very intense and generalized balance in aromas, flavors and memories. Why in wines are we afraid of intensity? In wines, as in people, a very marked intensity is usually accompanied by a certain imbalance or even eccentricity. But it should not always be that way. When we join, as in this 2009 a very high intensity and the purest balance we reach almost perfection. And let's not look excuses or justifications, the neurons drive the intensity in general crazy, so they need the counterpoint of balance. As much intensity and strength as it has this 2009 can only hide a huge amount of energy.

When we know a wine, we usually know how it will be even before uncork it. But sometimes we get surprises, because the wines are changing at over time. In any great wine we can speak, roughly, of three great stages: Youth, until 4-6 years, fullness, until 10-15 years, and maturity,
until it lives well. At each stage the wine usually transmits us with precision and definition a series of sensations. Now the 2009 Pisón is in a moment of transition, between the end of his overwhelming youth and the beginning of a promising fullness.

But sometimes the surprise is not in the wine, but in us, in our perception of reality Any great wine is like a book, a painting, a landscape ..., a means of transmission of emotion and energy. And me for the first time, after many years and many bottles, I could enjoy in its true dimension, and I repeat, in its true dimension, that intermediate moment between a stage and
another, to appreciate how many sensations diminishing in intensity, many others transforming and thousands began to insinuate themselves. Until now I enjoyed the easy, precision and definition of any of the three stages, and avoided the seemingly difficult times of transition, keeping the wine until to enter fully into the next phase. And one day you realize that in the wine, as in life, not everything is black or white, there are thousands of seemingly difficult gray colors, which, while supposedly impure, hide also thousands of sensations. And then we discover new emotions, and more Energy.

VIÑA EL PISÓN 2005

Viña el Pisón 2005 is an impressive wine, capable of teaching you a thousand things that can
influence your character. I have been fortunate to know all his life, since he was born fourteen
years ago, until today. I drank enough bottles and it made me think for many hours. What if I can continue to drink it for many years. I like it a lot and it is already part of my life.

I am impressed by the ability of the vineyard to adapt and respond appropriately to the conditions of the 2005 vintage. In general it was a very good vintage, but with very high temperatures during every month, similar to the torrid 2003, with the only difference that in 2005 it rained abundantly in winter, and this was enough to the old vines endure until the end of September, offering ripe grapes and healthy, perfect for making great wines. At first it was thought that the good 2005 wines would be very pleasant since their youth, but not excessively long-lived.

However, and once again we are wrong, the passing of the years shows us that they evolve very slowly, and a very long life is foreseen.

But what impresses me most is its character, how wine is transforming during his lifetime. I drank it freshly bottled, imagined his future, and at the same time I proved that I was wrong. And then at 4, 6, 8 years, it happened to me, exactly same thing, I was wrong again. It is a wine in continuous movement, like many people capable of living many lives in a single life. And we end up accepting that the evolution of wine has been practically perfect, that it has its own life, and the best part is we don't know what tomorrow will be like. In each bottle, as with the best burgundy, we get excited.

I can never forget its hedonistic and tasty character of its youth. After, between the ages of 4 and 6 it was elegant, fine, subtle, light ... a wine of great beauty. Starting of the 6-7 years appear some incipient meat notes, perfectly integrated and subtly exciting. And more recently all the above merges, thus creating the forcefulness that characterizes the best wines in the world. Now, for 2-3 years incipient notes of maturity appear, which makes it much more complex and more attractive.

In each sip we do not drink only wine, the story is transmitted and especially the energy of the
vineyard. Directly and brilliantly, from Laguardia to our brain, energy and more energy.

VIÑA EL PISON 2004

Viña el Pisón 2004 is already a mythical wine, and will continue to be so for many years, at
level of the best wines and best vintages of Bordeaux and Burgundy. It all came together,
weather, stars, people, and the result was extraordinary. The term that best defines this wine is perfection. Beat such attractive concepts as quality at a stroke and seduction and directly introduces you to the world of emotions and energy, sweetly squeeze our conscious brain to be happy, and enter the unconscious to look for something else.

It is useless to talk about its different variables (alcohol, tannins, acidity, fruit ...) separately, since always and forever forms a whole. And we can't separate what inseparable. It is essential to make an assessment the whole. And then interact with wine, relax and think what we feel in those moments.

I like to compare 2005 and 2004. So close and so different. If 2005 has evolved throughout its life, 2004 is a wine in motion continuous. We can even talk about revolution in every cup. The wine is transformed, goes and it comes, it surprises you, it excites you, you enjoy it, you remember it, you caress it ... and again back to start, it transforms, comes and goes ... and so on as long as you feel like it. Can be enough a glass to not forget it, but better and easier if you drink it from the bottle in bottle.

I really like the concept of hedonism that represents 2004. Now, when many defend pleasurable vanilla-like pleasures and other additives, and many others who with eagerness and little knowledge make austerity a goddess, 2004 offers us a blunt, thoughtful, serious hedonism ... fully human. For his character outstanding, as with extraordinary people, it is not very easy to appreciate the true dimension of 2004, and it is sad that some fans only enjoy
its taste and quality, but if you can understand it, it is the most hedonistic wine in the world.

But what I like most is its mystery. Its ability to transmit to us throughout moment the feeling that we always have many more things to discover and enjoy. We accept that wine is continually transformed, and we emotionally we move at your pace. Like here they people that as much as talk always surprise you with new conversation topics and always make you feel happy, enjoying that something else, the unknown, the unexpected, the mysterious ...

Perhaps this mystery, both in wines and in everything, is intimately linked to more pure and unknown energy. 2004 is an eternal wine, oblivious to the passage of time, to somewhat inexpressive principle but little by little is showing its full potential.

It is the only wine that plays with our emotions, interacts with us, and not vice versa as in the rest of the wines. It is difficult to define this unknown type of energy.

As you can imagine, these wines are expensive. And there is no other option. We do not go to
deepen the value of money, here we only talk about wines. And there are wines for everything
what they transmit to us we always have the feeling that they are very economical, at margin that we have money or not to buy them. I would like all of us we were emotionally prepared to drink and enjoy the best wines of the world, and do it as many times as possible, because the occasion when it arises must take advantage of it sometimes 12 friends get together and each one brings a different vintage, and together we share the dreams.

A few months ago a good friend invited me to a 2004 Viña El Pisón Magnum, and I can assure you that it was one of the 20-30 wines that I have enjoyed the most in all my life, and a feeling of infinite energy flooded the entire space.

Salvador Lopez

salva@spaincultureandmore.ca

Sun, salt, life and light…SPAIN