Bodegas Bentomiz

Knowing that Spain has a reputation for good wines, we decided our trip here wouldn't be complete without a visit to a winery. Because we are staying in one of the country's lesser known wine regions, we had some trouble finding a winery to visit, but eventually we got lucky and came across Bodegas Bentomiz, a smallish (they produce 30,000 bottles per year!), family run winery.


The wines of the Malaga province are known to typically be sweet, dessert wines which neither Jason or I are particularly fond of. Despite this fact, we were excited to visit one of the regions wineries to check it out.

When we arrived at the winery, we learned that we were visiting during the harvest. All of the recently picked grapes were lying out on pallets to allow the sun to concentrate their sugars.


Our wonderful hostess, Clara (who is pretty much a one woman show when it comes to the daily workings of the winery), gave us an excellent tour and explanation of the wine making process.


We were excited to learn that this particular winery actually produced two sweet, white wines; a dry, white; and a dry red. Interestingly, we learned that all of the white wines they produce are made from the same grapes and the difference in the final product is solely dependent on how the grapes are processed. After tasting the difference between the sweet and dry whites, it was really neat to learn about the different production processes for each. As it turns out, the main difference is the sugar concentration step that we had seen on our way in to the winery. While the grapes used to produce the dry white are juiced and fermented immediately after being picked, those to be used for the sweet whites are left to sit in the sun before being processed.

After learning all about the processes, Clara even let us climb up and look into the fermentation vessels where this year's harvest was slowly being turned into wine.


Our next stop was the bottling line where we were shown a new "corking" method being used by the winery. Clara told us about how they had decided they didn't want to worry about the issues such as bacteria and bad cork associates with using a traditional cork in their bottles. They also wanted to avoid the inaccurate, but predominant stereotype of "cheapness" associated with a twist-top lid. So, to get around these, they are using a glass "cork" to bottle their wines. It was a really elegant solution that we were really impressed with.


Finally, it was off to the wine cellar for an opportunity to purchase anything we might have particularly enjoyed during the tasting. Sadly, we don't have any room to take some back to England, so we were only able to pick up one bottle to enjoy while we are here. It will probably be along time before we get to have it again too - it's not yet exported to the US and in the UK it's only stalked by two- and three- Michelin star restaurants!

To complete a great day, we had a nice dinner on the beach in Salobrena after watching the sunset over the mountains. Man I love this place!