Robert Parker acknowledges
Pesquera excellence – in Spanish!
He places the bodega among the “best
of the best”
Catalonian publishing
house RBA recently published ‘The
World's Greatest Wine Estates'.
In the book, the wine world’s international
guru Robert M. Parker chooses a limited
number of bodegas among the estates, qualifying
them as the “best of the best”.
He was impressed by their dedication to
quality, constancy and excellence. Pesquera
is one of the bodegas chosen.
“In Ribera del Duero, only Vega Sicilia
can be compared with Alejandro Fernández’s
Pesquera,” with this phrase the well-known
US critic opens his section devoted to the
Pesquera Group, where praise is plentiful
for both the owner and his wines.
Of Alejandro Fernández he writes
“his face resembles the twisted tempranillo
vines,” praising his determination
and reviewing his track record before finally
commenting that, “against all odds,
Fernández has become a legend in
the wine merchant circles and now enjoys
an excellent reputation among his colleagues
for having brought the eyes of the world
to look on Ribera del Duero. […] All
of this is well worth mentioning, coming
from a man who has never received a formal
education in oenology”.
In reference to the way it is made, Parker
compares Pesquera to a great Bordeaux because
it was designed to age in the bottle, “quite
unlike much of the Spanish stock that ages
in the wine-cellar and is put on sale once
completely mature”.
As for wines such as ‘Janus Gran Reserva
1994' (97 points) he writes, “this
could be the best Pesquera ever made. A
gentle giant, without edges”. Of ‘Janus
Gran Reserva 1995' (94 points) he regrets
that there are only 1,000 cases of this
wine “extraordinarily youthful and
lively despite having aged three years in
oak”. As for ‘Gran Reserva 1994'
(92 points) “it has an approachable
yet structured personality”, while
‘Gran Reserva 1995' (91 points) counts
on “a special complexity”.
This book is the Spanish edition of ‘The
World's Greatest Wine Estates. A Modern
Perspective', launched in November 2005.
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