Land, Oak, Grape and Sun, Bodegas TRUS celebrates its 25th anniversary
15 March 2024
At Bodegas Palacios Vinos de Finca we welcome three new additions to our family. Our aim, as always, is to achieve the best wines that can be obtained based on each vintage and each soil. And without losing sight of this mission, the result is the following:
Trus Albillo Mayor Reserva 2020, a wine for ageing that already shows us all its complexity and elegance. As Rafael García, winemaker at Bodegas Trus explains, "despite being a reserve wine due to its long ageing in bottle, we must give importance to the variety and the expression of the soils from which it comes, giving it an ageing with little importance in wood and that it is the passage of time with its long rest in bottle that makes the variety reach its maximum expression".
In Trus Albillo Mayor Reserva 2020 the soil plays an important role, that is why it has not been given a marked oak, but the aim has been to preserve the character of the variety and the purity of the calcareous soils of old vineyards over 50 years old in Peñaranda de Duero, the place where it comes from.
This wine has been harvested by hand in boxes of 15 kilos and crates of 300 kilos. Destemmed and crushed for a brief cold maceration. Subsequent bleeding, brief pressing and light racking prior to alcoholic fermentation at a controlled temperature of 14 to 18ºC for about 20 days. Aged for six months in used 225-litre barrels from selected cooperages which, due to their low toasting, will give us a minimum contribution to the wine and consequently a greater prominence to the variety and its evolution during the long period of rest in the bottle. Bottled in August 2021.
The next to join the Bodegas Nivarius family is Lía Reserva 2017, a new sparkling wine for which we have sought " creaminess above all else, opting for fine bubbles and roundness in the style of Champagne", says our winemaker at Bodegas Nivarius, Raúl Tamayo. We have made a selection of old vines of viura in goblet-trained vines on the slopes of Moncalvillo and Sonsierra in La Rioja (between 500 and 700 metres above sea level); white garnacha from Clavijo (650 metres), for greater depth, and white maturana from our Finca Las Arcas estate in Nalda (820 metres) to give it softness and aromatics.
The soils from which they come are mainly sandy with some clay from the Moncalvillo, Clavijo and Nalda areas and calcareous silt only for half of the Viura we use. They are generally well-defined soils, with colluvial rocks on the surface, with some clay layers from 3 metres deep. This blend gives us structure, freshness, volume and length in the wine.
Harvest at optimum aromatic maturity. Light pressing without destemming, in the absence of oxygen. Fermentation with indigenous yeasts, the first three months using the batonnage technique twice a week, followed by static ageing on the fermentation lees. After 14 months of static ageing on the lees, the wine is bottled for the second fermentation in the bottle.
It is aged for a minimum of 60 months on the lees from the second fermentation. This is followed by a minimum of 12 months on its lees to allow the lees to settle with periodic stirring.
Finally,
Nivarius Reserva 2016 is our great white wine for ageing. It comes from goblet-trained Viura vineyards, with an average age of 70 years, located in Sonsierra, on the slopes of Moncalvillo, between 500 and 700 metres above sea level. As Raúl Tamayo recalls, "the 2016 vintage was a vintage of grapes with a lot of freshness and finesse, yet delicate at the same time".
The soils are mainly lime-limestone on the northern slope, Sonsierra. Ferrous sand with a little clay in depth on the southern slope of the Ebro Valley, Moncalvillo area, this mixture gives us structure, freshness, volume and length in the wine.
Harvest at optimum aromatic maturity, light pressing, in the absence of oxygen, fermentation with indigenous yeasts in oak barrels, the first three months the battonage technique is carried out twice a week and then aged statically on the lees of fermentation for 12 months.
The wine is aged for a minimum of 12 months in barrels, with the lees from the second fermentation, in French oak barrels. 15% of the barrels are new and the rest are used for between 2 and 8 uses.
25 years of learning
On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of Bodega Trus, we look back and see that the road we have travelled over the last quarter of a century has given us the experience to better understand our soils and their influence on the different wines we make. Experience has given us the know-how and a better understanding of each vintage to continue directing our work in translating the expression of the terroir, the plant and the climate into a bottle of wine.
For this reason, in the years to come we want to continue to transfer what nature gives us by making wines linked to our land and our territory, maintaining our wine-growing heritage and giving back to the countryside what it offers us day by day. For us, this is the way to consolidate a house in time, Bodegas Trus.
