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Return Words by Dan Keeling to Sender Jonatan Garcia Lima, Suertes del Marqués, Orotava Valley, Tenerife Photographs by Benjamin McMahon Tenerife wine fuelled the British Empire during the 1600s. Now a new wave of winemaking has bought it back in vogue after an extended hiatus “The message to the world is that Tenerife wine quantities of wine to British warships on their way is nothing new. It has been around for centuries. to conquer the globe. The thing is the gap of 200 years when it was in During the 17th century, wine was a decline.” So says winemaker Jonatan Garcia necessity rather than a luxury. Poor hygiene Lima of Suertes del Marqués, the Tenerife estate rendered most water undrinkable, especially on that, alongside a collective of like-minded dreamers long ocean voyages, and ports in Tenerife, Madeira, known as Envínate, is leading a vinous renaissance Gibraltar and the Azores were essential provision on the island. A similar story is playing out across stops en route from Britain to the Empire. Of Spain: up-and-coming producers farming unwant- course, such strategic importance wasn’t lost on ed old vines in regions such as Ribeira Sacra in the Royal Navy, which tried, unsuccessfully, to Galicia and the Gredos mountains near Madrid to wrest Tenerife from Spanish control in 1657, 1767 make wines that express a unique sense of origin. and 1797 (famously resulting in Rear-Admiral “That Tenerife didn’t export wine for two centuries Horatio Nelson’s right arm being amputated after has benefits,” says Garcia Lima. “Merchants couldn’t demand indigenous grapes be replanted with international varieties, which helped to prevent phylloxera from ever getting here.” Located in the Atlantic ocean due west of the Sahara desert, it’s a wonder fine wine can be grown on Tenerife at all. Numerous flights to the south of the island bring a daily influx of garrulous teenagers, stressed-out families and pensioners for an almost guaranteed fix of holiday sun, but at such latitude grapes usually struggle to retain freshness. Here, around the resorts, the climate is hot and arid; a landscape of palm trees, ravines, candelabra-like cacti and serrated rock formations that recall A Fistful of Dollars. However, it’s on Tenerife’s mountainous north coast, where the central mega-volcano Teide traps rain clouds blown south on Alisios winds, and the environment becomes lush and subtropical, that fortune smiles on viticulture. It’s also here, several hundred years ago, that Above: Jonatan Garcia Lima of Suertes del Marqués. merchants made riches by supplying huge Right: Workers in the Orotava Valley tying canes back IMAGE CAPTION NAME NAME PHOTO CREDIT to vine roots using the 'Cordon Trenzado' method Aditional credit here with italics, description of image and date 2019 74 Noble Rot 75 Noble Rot 76 Noble Rot 77 Noble Rot Giants’ hair braids. Spindly spider legs crawling up steep terrain. However your brain processes seeing the ancient vines in Orotava Valley vineyards, there’s nowhere else on the planet quite like it the battle of Santa Cruz), commemorated today by Giants’ hair braids. Rib cages. Spindly spider legs three lions on the capital’s crest. However, conflict crawling up steep terrain. However your brain had little effect on the success of British and Irish processes seeing Suertes del Marqués’ Orotava merchants exporting the island’s popular sweet, Valley vineyards for the first time, there’s nowhere fortified Malmsey. While sales peaked at 15 million else on the planet quite like it. Trained with a rare litres in 1600, it would take an American thirst for technique called ‘Cordon Trenzado’, workers Madeira to diminish sales significantly by 1700; painstakingly tie long canes back to ancient sinewy later, a dry white known as ‘Vidonia’ became roots after pruning, then prop them off the floor with Tenerife’s last significant export, until trade died poles. Production is split 25 per cent between out in 1830. “If you came to Tenerife 50 years ago, white wine (also check out excellent entry-level you’d see a landscape of banana plantations,” says ‘Trenzado’) and 75 per cent red, which Garcia Lima historian Carlos Cólogan Soriano, the seventh-gen- has been refining since taking over as winemaker eration descendant of John Cólogan, one of the three years ago. Picking grapes early to retain island’s most successful merchants. “If you came acidity, pressing less and using long macerations 200 years ago, you’d see only vines.” are some of the techniques introduced for 2016 But enough history. Today, ‘Vidonia’ has ‘7 Fuentes’, a ‘village’ red made from Listán Negro been reimagined by Suertes del Marqués as one and Castellana grapes bought from other growers. of Spain’s most exciting white wines. A blend of old Fresh and peppery with round, supple tannins, it vine Listán Blanco from clay and sand soils around tastes like Jura Poulsard grown on volcanic soil, the Orotava Valley, a northern appellation where and is a fascinating gateway into a nascent range cloud cover moderates temperatures by some of single-vineyard cuvées. 10 degrees from the rest of the island, this is a Roughly translated, Suertes del Marqués smoky-fresh, future classic that will appeal to lovers means ‘inheritance of the marques’, although of Jura Chardonnay and Chablis. Unlike the Listán Garcia Lima isn’t from aristocratic lineage. His Blanco grown in Sherry country, known there as father Francisco began buying vineyards in the Palomino, here it has mouthwatering acidity and a Orotava Valley in 1986, selling most of his crop to signature smokiness from being grown on volcanic local domaines, and decided to begin producing clay: majoring on minerals rather than fruit, if a wine wine commercially only in 2006. A seminal moment could be described as “liquid rock”, this is it. Howev- came two years later when he hired Roberto er, the most intriguing thing about ‘Vidonia’ isn’t that Santana, a young local winemaker who had just it is resurrecting a long-forgotten style, or that the returned to the island after studying oenology in elegant and precise 2017 is one of the most Alicante and working in Jumilla. As they introduced delicious whites I’ve drunk all year, it’s the vineyards organic, low-interventionist philosophies, their where it’s grown. collaboration was ground zero for a new wave Roberto Santana and Alfonso Torrente of Envínate in Taganana, Tenerife 78 Noble Rot 79 Noble Rot Gone are the days of young vignerons needing hundreds of thousands of pounds for start-up costs. By thinking creatively, Envínate has become one of the hottest names in wine of Tenerife wine, bringing centuries in the wilder- historic varieties,” says Roberto Santana, climbing ness to a close. In 2016, Roberto left to focus on the ‘Margalagua’ vineyard. Envínate found this and Envínate with business partners Alfonso Torrente, neighbouring vineyards on Tenerife’s north-eastern Laura Ramos and Jose Martínez, while Jonatan coast from studying old textbooks; some of the took control at Suertes del Marqués, creating ungrafted vines here are 300 years old, sprouting two island estates that are now the talk of top randomly from plots some 200m above the Atlantic. wine lists around the globe. However, although Taganana is protected from Envínate is a unique project that operates commercial development by Unesco accreditation like a collective of flying winemakers, who, unlike (“Elsewhere on Tenerife, people would rather their 1980s namesakes, prize authenticity above abandon vineyards than sell them, in case someone all else. Piecing together fruit from a series wants to buy them to build a hotel,” says Roberto), of guerrilla-style vineyard purchases, rentals and many of the region’s most historic sites are so collaborations with local growers, they produce inaccessible, they will never be regenerated. It’s 14 cuvées from four different parts of Spain: a shame, because this is a sublime place to grow Almansa, Extremadura, Ribeira Sacra and Tenerife. grapes: high vineyards, alive with birdsong and sea The last two regions are overseen by Alfonso air, fostering thrilling, piquant, saline wines. Torrente and Roberto Santana, whose precipitous Later, back at Mesón Castellano, Roberto’s vineyards easily top my ‘World’s Most Dangerous father’s restaurant in Santa Cruz, we drink other & Hard to Work’ chart. Economically and logistically, Envínate cuvées made elsewhere on Tenerife no large commercial producers would commit to (‘Benje’ from Santiago del Teide, ‘Migan’ and ‘Palo such places: high-altitude mountainsides where Blanco’ from La Orotava), and indulge in one of the grapes must be carried over treacherous pathways, duo’s favourite pastimes – blind tasting. Roberto but whose hard-won results deserve to be prized and Alfonso sniff, sip and dissect a succession like precious jewels. Gone are the days of young of unidentified bottles: Where is it from? How old vignerons needing hundreds of thousands of is it? What makes it good? One by one, wines pounds for start-up costs for hi-tech wineries, new from top French and Italian domaines are revealed, oak barrels and marketing managers, or to absorb alongside their ambitions. Pitting themselves years of waiting for newly planted vines to mature. against the best in the world, the Tenerife new By thinking creatively, Envínate has become one wave has only just begun. of the hottest names in European wine. “We call Taganana ‘Jurassic Park’ because Top: Alfonso Torrente and Roberto Santana of Envínate in ‘Margalagua’ vineyard. when we arrived, we found a really diverse mix of Below: The north coast of Tenerife 80 Noble Rot 81 Noble Rot.