Lusco Do Miño

RIAS BAIXAS

This benchmark Albariño is a brilliant, exotic dry white.

What the critics are saying:

“The wine takes its singular character from the most exceptional wines in the Pazo Pinero. It’s a style that is far removed from run-of-the-mill commercial Albarino bottling, with their excessicve youth and yields, their abuse of selective yeasts, and so on. In contrast, this wine is dry and mineral, fresh and fruity, structured and long. As with other serious Albarinos, its virtue become apparent from its third year.” The Finest Wines of Rioja, Barquin, Gutierrez & De La Serna.

From 1984, José Antonio López revived world awareness and respect for Galicia's Albariño variety as founder and managing partner of the Morgadío Estate, located in the Miño River district of Condado do Tea. He accomplished this by consistently offering a fully ripe style (not easy in this rain-soaked part of Spain), giving new dimension to Albariño's range of flavours and being the first to elicit comparisons to top Viognier. In 1996, José Antonio struck out on his own to create an intense, dry Albariño that would fully realise his personal ideals. A purchase option - successfully exercised in 2001 - was obtained for Pazo Piñeiro, a twelve-acre southeast-facing Albariño estate in Alxén near Salvaterra do Miño (also Condado do Tea), featuring an important 16th-century granite manor house (Pazo). The thick-walled, cool, insulated cellar accommodates the tiny, modern bodega facility.
Since 1996, Lusco Albariño has been consistently acclaimed by the Spanish and international press, establishing itself as a leader for authenticity and quality of this increasingly popular wine style. Approximately 3,400 cases per year are produced of this full-bodied yet decidedly racy and mineral wine. We have shipped this from the mid 90’s. A recent addition to the range here is the remarkable value, Zios, which comes from a fragmented selection of twenty year old Albariño groves in Salvaterra, a subdistrict of Condado do Tea. A warm, dry growing area, the vines are planted at altitudes between 150-300 meters on decomposed granite. For all the wines, Lusco use a sorting table to select the fruit, very much a rarity in the Rias Baixas, and the yields are cropped at a very low 40-45 hl/ha. Only 3000 cases are produced annually with gives you an idea of the dedication this Domaine has towards producing only the finest expression of this grape possible.