Dominio de Tares

The top of the Bierzo wines - Dominio de Tares

Dominio de Tares is one of the leading wineries in the DO Bierzo. Founded in 2000, the estate is one of the pioneers of the revival of wines from this small wine-growing region in Castile-Léon. The philosophy includes the complete concentration on the native viticulture - including autochthonous grape varieties. These efforts are worthwhile, as the wines have been awarded with prizes by Wine Enthusiast, Guía Peñín or Robert Parker more often in the past few years.

The Bierzo appellation

The Bierzo region is located in the northwest of the province of León, in the north of Spain, bordering the provinces of Orense, Lugo and Asturias. It occupies an area of about 3,000 square kilometres. It is a small-scale agricultural area, as the land passed from father to son by inheritance, and in each of these transfers the land was divided and shared anew with each change of ownership. In this respect it is very similar to what happened in Burgundy, for example.

The landscape is gently rolling, allowing the best slopes to be chosen for optimum sun exposure. The soil is a mixture of clay, limestone, quartzite and slate, there is a temperate Mediterranean climate with cold winters and warm summers without ever being excessively hot, and most of the rainfall (around 700 mm/year) occurs in winter.

The portfolio of Dominio de Tares

The vineyards for the estate have been selected through an elaborate process to get the best out of the grape varieties. These are:

• Mencia
• Godello

These two grape varieties are names you don't hear too often in the wine world, and so the wines of Dominio de Tares promise an interesting excursion into the wine world of Bierzo. The grapes for the wines are exclusively harvested by hand, each individual plot is also vinified separately in order to preserve the characteristics of the individual soil compositions. Fermentation takes place in steel or wooden tanks, followed by maturation in American or French oak barrels. Depending on the wine, this lasts from 4 to 18 months. The highest quality wines are also bottle-aged for more than a year.

Tip for the connoisseur

While the Dominio de Tares wines are the top products from the appellation, the estate produces wines under the name Dominio Dostares (attention, danger of confusion!), which are officially only declared as country wine. Thus, they are significantly cheaper, however, awards by greats like Robert Parker with more than 90 points show that they are hardly inferior to their big siblings - a tip for the well-read wine friend.