Our featured wine for February is a lovely red from Northwestern Spain. The Ribeira Sacra, or Sacred Riverbank, features some steeply terraced vineyards that date back to the Ancient Romans! These terruños are very difficult to farm, and so only the bravest producers will try! 

The Finca Meixeman delivers lovely red-fruited flavors with notes of green almond, pink peppercorn, roses, and cured meat. 

Guímaro and Nils Pedro Rodriguez: 

The family of Pedro Rodriguez has always produced a little bit of wine for their consumption at home. However, it wasn’t until 1991, with Pedro leading the way, that the family decided to move into commercial wine production, with the creation of the Ribeira Sacra denomination in the early 1990s. Pedro decided to name the winery “Guímaro,” a nickname of his grandfather’s translating to “rebel.” 

Pedro then began to learn from a famous winemaker in nearby Bierzo, Raul Perez. Perez taught Pedro the value of organic farming and native yeast fermentation, as well as how to express the many, varying terroirs of their different vienyards. 

One of those vineyards, Finca Meixeman, is a small plot planted 70 years ago on schist soil. This is the first vineyard that Pedro bottled wines from when he first started the winery nearly 30 years ago. 

What to eat at Reserve with the Finca Meixeman: 

Ribeira Sacra is one of the best reds with seafood, so I would love this with many of our market fish offerings. However, I think this red is absolutely best with wild game or braised meats, so I would like it with our Lamb Brisket Casoncelli most of all! 

Make a reservation to enjoy Finca Meixeman soon.