🍷 What makes the Rioja region of Spain a must-visit destination for wine lovers❓
🎙️ On the Unreserved Wine Talk podcast, you’ll hear the stories and tips that answer those questions in our chat with Adam Lechmere, editor of The Smart Traveler's Wine Guide to Rioja among other books in this series.
🔗 Link in bio
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🏛️ As Adam explains, what they do so brilliantly in Rioja is combine traditional winemaking and outstanding wines with ultra-modern, avant-garde buildings often next door to ancient, gorgeous medieval churches.
⛪ They're all higgledy piggledy, all angles. You can go from the door of this hotel to a medieval church in about ten steps.
🍇 What are the best food pairings for Rioja wines?
🥩 Lamb and Rioja is a brilliant combination, according to Adam and I agree.
🌱 The rule of thumb for any wine region is to pair it with the food that's made in the region. What grows together, goes together.
🐑 Lamb is grown and raised in huge numbers in the Rioja hills.
🍂 They prepare lamb in different ways, depending on the time of year.
🍖 He particularly loves lamb cutlets, very thin cutlets.
🔥 They burn a large bundle of vine cuttings from previous vintages, so they’re dried vine twigs on the grill, which they also do in Bordeaux.
🎉 What’s the sticky history behind the Battle of Wine festival in La Rioja?
🎊 As Adam observes, when you have lots of anything that is also your livelihood, you celebrate it.
⛰️ The Battle of Wine festival is a series of processions that begins about a week before on the 23rd of June, and it culminates with everybody going up onto the hill to what they call the temple.
💦 This is after everybody's been drinking and partying all night and then they throw wine all over each other.
🛢️ People chuck bags of wine at each other and upend buckets over their heads and end up absolutely drenched in wine.
🔗 Want to listen to these answers or read the article? Go to the link above or in my bio.
🍾 Have you tried a Rioja wine❓
Let me know in the comments 👇
