Cruising out from Rome, we passed Gibraltar and headed north, stopping in the city of Cadiz in the Andalusia region of southwestern Spain.
From the port in Cadiz I took a half hour ferry ride across the harbor to the town of El Puerto de Santa Maria. The town is part of the Sherry triangle and I visited a couple of sherry bodegas that were within walking distance of the ferry terminal.
I visited two, Bodegas Guttierrez Colosia at Calle Bajamar, 40 and Osborne at Calle Los Moros, 7. One is a low key, mom and pop, no frills operation and the other is one of the most famous Sherry houses in Spain.
If you’ve ever done a wine trip to Sonoma and Napa wine country, in general there is a different vibe between both appellations. In Sonoma you can drive up to the winery and there’s a good chance you might see the owner driving a dusty tractor after a day in the fields, in Napa, you walk into a multi-million dollar tasting room that looks like an art museum.
Bodegas Colosia looked like what you would expect a no nonsense, working warehouse to look like while it’s obvious Osborne spent a lot more resources on their tasting room. They have a restaurant on premise as well.
Sherry is an underrated wine with a niche market. They range from the bone dry Fino to the thick and sweet Pedro Xemenez.
Problem is that in most liquor stores they will stock the inexpensive, mass-produced sherries. These wines really come into their own when you drink one from an artisanal producer.
The Fino I sample here were much more rounder and easy drinking than the mass-produced ones I’ve tried in the past. What surprised me were the Olorosos, I had always though they were sweet but the couple that I sampled at the two bodegas were more off dry than sweet and much more drinkable than my experience with them in the past. The Cream sherries were created for the British market.
What I sampled:
Osborne
Fino Quinta Fino
La Honda Amontillado
10RF Medium
Bailen Oloroso
Santa Maria Cream
Osborne Vermouth
Bodegas Gutierrez Colosia
Fino
Amontillado
Oloroso
Cream Sherry
Moscatel Soleado
Pedro Ximenez
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