VENI, VIDI, VINO
DISH MEL PRIESTLEY // MEL@VUEWEEKLY.COM
Shaking the sherry stigma
Recommendations: Osborne Santa María Cream Sherry Fernando de Castilla Classic Manzanilla Sherry Noe Pedro Ximenez Viejo Sherry
A look at Spain's historical wine I avoided sherry for years, though looking back I'm puzzled as to why. Perhaps it was the stigma—people reacted very similarly when I mentioned it: a mixture of dismissal and outright disgust, because in this area of the world a lot of people, even those in the wine industry, are only familiar with cheap cooking sherry. Yet sherry deserves attention in its own right. It is Spain's most historically significant wine, functioning as the foundation of the Spanish wine industry much like icewine in Canada or port in Portugal. While sherry is often thought of as a version of port for the simple fact that both are fortified wines, in actuality this is not so simple.
Sherry hails from the region around the town of Jerez de la Frontera in Andalusia, Spain; the name comes from the Anglicization of Jerez (also spelled Xeres). Sherry has been produced here for more than a millennium and by the 16th century had become a favourite drink of European nobility; the United Kingdom took a particular liking to sherry and many of the major sherry cellars were founded by British families. Ninety-five percent of sherry is made from the local Spanish white grape variety Palomino, with the Muscatel and Pedro Ximénez varieties making up the balance. After the wine is made in the usual method it is fortified with brandy and then put through a process known
as solera, a system of progressively blending and aging sherry by moving it through a network of old oak barrels. There are seven different types of sherry, created by using the solera in different ways, and they fall along a spectrum of dry to sweet: • Manzanilla and Fino: light, elegant and bone dry, with a peculiar salty sea-spray tang that is redolent of the air of the coastal Spanish region from which they originate. These wines are dependent on the development of flor, a yeast that develops on the surface of the wine as it ages. • Amontillado and Palo Cortado: aged Finos that are fortified to a higher level of alcohol and then put through
another solera, causing them develop a deep colour and rich, nutty flavours. Amontillado is off-dry while Palo Cortado is dry and aged slightly longer. • Oloroso: an aged sherry that remains untouched by flor and is quite dark and nutty, resulting from the highest level of fortification and exposure to oxygen of any sherry. • Cream: originally created specifically for the British export market in the 1800s, made by sweetening Oloroso sherry with a hefty amount of Pedro Ximénez wine. Cream sherries range in quality from syrupy and cloyingly sweet to wonderfully complex and balanced. • Pedro Ximénez: the very sweet, dark
and viscous as molasses, made solely (as the name suggests) from the eponymous grape variety. Manzanilla and Fino sherries are among the best wines to pair with seafood; that salty tang is perfect beside freshly shucked oysters or ceviche. They also must be consumed within a day or two of opening, just like regular white wine. Palo Cortado and Oloroso sherries are surprisingly good accompaniments to soups, olives and cheese (especially Spain's manchego) while cream sherries are usually best served on their own after a meal, or, in the case of superrich Pedro Ximénez, slathered over vanilla ice cream.
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