Artadi Izar-Leku

The second vintage for this amazing and unusual sparkling Txakoli, the 2016 Izar-Leku was produced by the traditional method of second fermentation in bottle, where the wine spent 18 months, but the base wine was with lees for a year (one-third in barrel) before it was put in bottle. The bottles are kept at low temperature, 13 degrees Celsius and nowadays at 11.5 degrees Celsius, which makes for a slower fermentation that produces very fine bubbles. They have not disgorged all the bottles and some are going to be kept for a bit longer, but the wine is sold out and in high demand. This is sharp, mineral and saline, bone dry and clean, precise, from a slightly warmer year than 2015 in the zone. It's slightly different, quite pure, with some nutty undertones, with a slightly rounder palate and quite long. The most striking feature of this is its salinity in the finish. Not surprisingly, the vines are some 200 meters away from the sea! They were helped by Raphaël Bérêche from Champagne fame to produce this sparkling wine. 20,000 bottles produced—what they can get from the almost four hectares of vineyards.