Javier Sanz Rey Santo Verdejo Viura Rueda 2025
£11.45
The wine
The house blend from five generations of Verdejo growers at La Seca. Viura rounds out the Verdejo's cut, giving citrus and green apple over a softer core, with the fennel and cut-grass note that marks good Rueda. Crisp, dry and thoroughly useful at the table.
Rey Santo means the holy king, referring to Ferdinand III of Castile. Verdejo with Viura, the latter adding body and softening Verdejo's characteristic bitter-almond edge. Rueda sits at around 700 metres on stony soils, and the altitude is what preserves the acidity.
The producer
Javier Sanz
View all Javier Sanz winesJavier Sanz Viticultor farms at La Seca in Rueda, and the family have grown grapes there since the nineteenth century. They hold a plot of pre-phylloxera ungrafted Verdejo, which is exceptionally rare.
Rueda sits on the high Castilian plateau at around 700 metres, on stony soils that drain hard. Verdejo is its grape, native to the region and recorded there since the eleventh century, and it gives fennel, citrus and a characteristic bitter-almond finish. For centuries it was made oxidatively in the manner of Sherry; the modern fresh style dates only from the 1970s, when Marques de Riscal came from Rioja to make white wine here and changed the region entirely.
Rey Santo, the holy king, refers to Ferdinand III of Castile. The estate is among the most respected in the appellation.
