Valdespino Palo Cortado Single Cask Macharnudo Alto 2001 (37.5cl)
£116.25
The wine
Dark gold in colour, this unique wine displays intense aromas of toasted hazelnut, orange peel, nutmeg and cinnamon along with the subtle mineral undertone characteristic of the wines from Pago Macharnudo Alto. The palate is complex, rounded and slightly spicy, with subtle notes of cloves and ginger. The finish is intense and persistent, with a slightly saline aftertaste.
Palo Cortado is the rarest of the sherry styles, a wine that begins under flor as a fino and then loses its veil, finishing oxidatively with the delicacy of one style and the depth of the other. Valdespino own their vineyards, Macharnudo among them, and are one of very few bodegas to bottle single-vineyard sherry. The grapes were picked at night to spare the bunches heat stress, sorted by ripeness, and three quarters destemmed and lightly crushed to take only the yema, the first and finest 60% of the must, which fermented in used sherry casks.
The producer
Valdespino
View all Valdespino winesValdespino is one of the oldest and most revered names in Jerez, a sherry house whose roots reach back centuries. It is celebrated above all for its single-vineyard bottlings and its refusal to compromise, making sherries of a purity and depth that connoisseurs treasure.
The jewel is the great albariza vineyard of Macharnudo Alto, source of the Inocente Fino, one of the last Finos still fermented in cask. Elsewhere the house draws on ancient soleras for Amontillados, Palo Cortados and Olorosos of extraordinary age, alongside a decadently sweet Pedro Ximénez.
From the bone-dry, saline Inocente and sea-fresh Manzanilla Deliciosa to the profound VOS bottlings and the sherry-based Herencia vermouth and quina, the range is a masterclass in the diversity of Jerez.
Historic, uncompromising and endlessly rewarding, Valdespino is sherry at its most serious. Discover a true benchmark of the region.
