Fedellos Do Couto - Bastarda 2018

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Producer	Fedellos Do Couto
Country	Spain
Region	Galicia
Varietal	Bastardo
Vintage	2018
Sku	01001
Size	750ml

Luis Taboada, recognizing the value of his ancient, north- and east-facing vineyards, teamed up with viticulturalist Pablo Soldavini, a proponent of organic farming and winemakers Curro Bareño and Jesús Olivares to found Fedellos do Couto in 2011. Bareño and Olivares were the talented team behind Ronsel do Sil, one of the most heralded estates in Ribeira Sacra, but both began their career in the Sierra de Gredos, where they were close friends and colleagues of Dani Landi, Fernando Garcia, and Marc Isart. This association is obvious in their wines: elegant and nuanced but persistent and powerful.

The winemaking at Fedellos is minimalist: native co-fermentations, long, gentle macerations in concrete, neutral French oak barrels, or small fermentation bins with aging in concrete and/or various neutral French oak barrels and foudres, but mainly 500L demi-muids. Four wines are currently produced: Bastarda, Cortezada, and Lomba dos Ares and a field blend of white varieties, Conasbrancas.

After years of difficulty getting their wines approved by the DO, Curro and Jesus have decided to withdraw their project from the zone. This will allow them to continue to fine-tune their winemaking without fear of the forces of homogenization that characterize many regions in Spain. Within the Val do Bibei, they are identifying additional sites that warrant single-vineyard designation and have launched a new project further upstream and closer to the headwaters of the Bibei - Peixes. Regardless of what is on the outside of the bottles, their dedication to site-specific expression and minimalist winemaking guarantees that what is on the inside are some of the most revealing and exciting wines in our portfolio.

Known as Merenzao in Valdeorras and across the border in Portugal as Bastardo, this variety originates from the foothills of the Alps, where it is known as Trousseau. A difficult grape to reach full ripeness in the Jura, plantings of Trousseau there are fairly modest. In the relatively warmer climate of Ribeira Sacra, it is more successful, which explains why there is a fair amount planted in this corner of the Iberian peninsula. So unique are its racy, red-fruit flavors and spiciness that Fedellos do Couto makes a varietal-based cuvée of Bastardo from their vineyards. As with their other wines, some other varieties are co-fermented with the Bastardo. Please don’t ask us for exact percentages as not even Curro or Jesús could tell you. And to keep you off balance, they also call it Bastarda.