Dominio de Atauta is a really unique wine from the Spanish wine region of Ribera del Duero.  As mentioned in my ratings of Ferratus, I’m a bit down on the region.  The inexpensive wines from the region are often hollow and thin on fruit, the more expensive can often be over-oaked.  Also many of the wines, though perfect technically, seem to be lacking a lot of character. I feel that many Ribera wineries have lost touch with the terroir of the region in order to attain the perfect model for an “international” wine.  I’m convinced that it would be very hard to pick some Ribera wines out of a lineup of blockbuster-style reds from around the world….many of these wines lack a sense of place…and they can also be exhausting to drink.  The wines of the Dominio de Atauta winery are the opposite of international…they are firmly rooted in the terroir that the wine-maker tries to reflect in his wines.  The winemaker; Bernard Sourdais is from the Loire Valley, but has been working in Spain for over a decade.  He brings a real French sensibility to the idea of terroir, a concept that is just catching on in a real way here in Spain.   The vineyards are very special; they are located at the far eastern end of the Denominacion, in the province of Soria.  The altitude is higher than most of Ribera, 950 meters and the vines are very old.  The youngest vines the winery uses are 60 years old, the oldest, 160!  The winery also practices biodynamic wine-making and the winery is built in a manner so as to blend into the landscape.  These are all facts that lead to the uniqueness of these wines…but a word of warning…these are not always easy wines.  These are not the big, sweet, juicy Riberas we have become used to.  When I first tasted the 2005, it was delightful in the nose, but the tannins were still quite rough in the mouth.  The wine has since come into a much better balance and is one of the most original and satisfying Riberas on the market…and also good value at 25€..    Even more spectacular are the single-vineyard wines, Llanos del Almendro, La Mala and Valdegatiles that range between 75 and 100€.  Read on for more details on the basic Dominio de Atauta red.  

Wine:  Dominio de Atauta 2005
Winery:  Dominio de Atauta
Denominacion de Origen (DO): Ribera del Duero
Alc: 14.6%
Grape varieties: 100% old vine Tinto Fino (Tempranillo) (some of the vines used in this wine are pre-phylloxera….120-160 years old!)
Oak regime:  18 months in new French oak
Price:  25€ retail in Madrid

Tasting notes
Visual:  Deep ruby
Nose:  Attractive, medium intensity…needs air to open up fruit more.  Very mineral nose, with black cherry and anis aromas…a touch of tasty aromas.  Quite complex.       
Mouth:  Cherry, earthy and mineral fruit, chalk in fore-palate, then toasty oak, great acidity…..finally serious and slightly hard tannins.    Long finish, but quite tannic.   A very lean and structured mouth for a Ribera. The wine really improved in the mouth with decanting.  The alcohol is really in balance for 14.6%.
Food:  Unlike many Riberas, this wine could go with a lots of less strong flavours, like wild mushrooms or Iberian pork.

Conclusion: Not a cookie cutter Ribera at all…very unique.  I put it blind once against a modern, juicy Rioja, Roda 2004, and many picked it as the Rioja.  The main reason for this is the leanness of the mouth, the impressive acidity, the restrained use of oak and the fresh red fruit aromas.  This makes the wine atypical amongst many of the current crop of Ribera Reservas, but in fact it is much more faithful to its terroir.  It is also a lot easier and more interesting to drink!