Bodegas Zarate
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Country of Origin: Spain
Location: Val do Salnés, Rías Baixas
People: Eulogio Pomares & Rebeca Montero, Owners |Eulogio Pomares, Winemaker
Viticulture: Practicing Biodynamic
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If you’re looking for classic, OG Albariño, you’ve gotta start with Bodegas Zárate. Back in the 1950s, Ernesto Zárate was the first to bottle single-vineyard Albariño and the first to effectively put this racy, aromatic variety on the world’s vinous map. He pioneered the high-quality winemaking techniques that are still used today. He founded the annual Cambados Albariño Fiesta and won it so many times he had to withdraw permanently from competition.
Today, Eulogio Pomares, the seventh generation, is steering the winery into the 21st century with biodynamic farming and low-intervention winemaking. His vines are ancient—from the oldest documented Albariño vineyard in the area, planted before phylloxera in 1850—and he farms them with care. All new plantings are massale selections from the estate’s old vines. He uses local seashells and seaweed as treatments instead of insecticide and fertilizers. He hasn’t tilled the soils since 1994, allowing a diverse micro-ecosystem to emerge and nourish his vines. In turn, his vines produce flavorful wines that showcase the freshness of the nearby Atlantic ocean. These are age-worthy and complex, some of the best examples of the varietal you can find. With centuries of winemaking tradition under this family’s belt, Bodegas Zárate is an undeniable legend in the region—but it’s the vibrant, lip-smacking wines that keep us coming back.
Media Links
YouTube: Bodega Zárate - D.O. Rías Baixas
Wineanorak.com: Visiting Zarate with Eulogio Pomares, one of the most exciting producers in Rías Baixas, Spain
Featured in Decanter 2/2023: "Eight Rías Baixas Names to Know"
Vinous 6/17/2021
"Founded in 1707, Zarare is not only one of the oldest wineries in Rías Baixas, but it’s consistently among the handful of its best producers. As is the case with virtually every estate in the region, it’s small, with only seven-and-a-half hectares of vines, from which owner and winemaker Eulogia Pomares makes a small range of wines, up to five per vintage, so availability is on the tight side, especially for the tiny-production, upper-end bottlings. These are Albariños built along classic lines, with the “regular” bottling made in stainless steel tanks, with lees contact, and the name-designated wines raised in a combination of large, neutral oak and concrete vessels. The top selections are built to age, but my experience with the entry-level bottling is that it also rewards some patience, regardless of vintage."
Wine Advocate 6/11/2020
"Most of the names that come to mind when we think of great Rías Baixas and great Albariño (but increasingly also red wines) originate in the Val do Salnés: Albamar, Do Ferreiro, Eulogio Pomares, Fulcro, Forjas del Salnés, Nanclares y Prieto, Narupa, Zárate… This is the zone with a true Atlantic/marine character and also the place with the most extreme fragmentation of the properties, with very small vineyards. 'Old-timers from Salnés never accepted the name Rías Baixas and didn’t agree about the other zones,' I was told more than once. 'They wanted to create an for the Salnés rather than putting together different zones that don’t have that much in common. But Rías Baixas was created and that was that.' In 1988, when the appellation was created, therewere three subzones; they added Soutomaior in October 1996, and then it was expanded again in May 2000 with the Ribeira do Ulla."