95+pts Parker’s WA And Under Twenty And Absolutely Delicious! Killer Red!

These are some of the most exciting wines I have tried this year. Bodegas Ponce is brought to us by Juan Antonio Ponce who started the winery in 2005 at the ripe old age of 23. He studied his craft under the great Spanish wine maker Telmo Rodriguez. Telmo’s wine was the number one wine on James Suckling’s Top 100 Spanish Wines of 2021. He is a genius at working with native Spanish varietals and making some of Spain’s greatest wines  Telmo was among the first to make significant wines in Toro, Rueda, Valdeorras, Malaga, Alicante and Cigales. Juan Antonio is following in his footsteps, starting with a piece of land in Manchuela, owned by his father that has ancient Bobal vines on it. The wine is the Bodegas Ponce P.F. 2020. PF stands for ‘pie franco’ which in Spanish means ungrafted and this wine comes from ancient ungrafted vines. Old vines make the finest red wine, huge concentration matched with balance and elegance that you cannot manufacture or propagate. Juan Antonio Ponce stands alone as the leader of Manchuela and as the master of the Bobal grape. Bobal can be rustic but with the age of the vines and Juan Antonio deft touch, the resulting wine is dazzling and bottom line an absolute steal for what’s in the bottle at the price with huge 95+pts Parker . Our price is strong and the wine is ridiculously good at $19.99. Scary good for the money.

Bodegas Ponce P.F. 2020  Deep ruby color with violet hues and impressive aromas of cherry, sour cherry, raspberry, plum, vanilla, pepper, tea, lavender, licorice, and bitter chocolate. On the palate, it has a medium body, medium tannins, and refreshing acidity. Juicy red and black fruits are mixed with notes of sweet spices, violet, cocoa, and dried herbs. Winemaker.

The 2020 P.F. shows the purity and potential of Bobal from ancient ungrafted vines (P.F. stand for “pie franco,” which in the Spanish language means “ungrafted”) from limestone-rich soils at 900 meters in altitude in a textbook Mediterranean vintage. The wine is complex and mineral with a chalky sensation, with supple tannins and great length. It fermented with 100% full clusters in open-top 4,500-liter French oak vats with indigenous yeasts and matured in those same vats for 10 months. It has 13% alcohol and a pH of 3.55. This has the depth of the nose, with terrific balance. For Juan Antonio Ponce, this is his more precise vintage, a little above the 2018, a year with great balance.95+pts Parker’s WA