Abadía Mantrús Verdejo 2017

Every so often I throw a wine tasting at my house. I’ll buy a group of wines I want to try and invite friends round. In return I ask them to bring a bottle with them that I put in the wine cupboard for a later date. Trouble is I never get the opportunity to drink the bottles my friends have bought because I’m out at other wine tastings. The upshot of this is I now have a cupboard full of wines that I know nothing about.

So this month I decided to throw a tasting of the bottles in the cupboard. Everyone was asked to pick a random number and that’s the bottle we drank. I’ve no idea who bought these wines or whether they’d be any good.

The first of these wines was a Spanish white wine from Rueda region made from the Verdejo grape. Now you can’t live in Madrid and not have tried a ton of Rueda Verdejos. Most bars will serve you this when you order white wine by the glass. So all my friends know what a Rueda tastes like, which is why we were pleasantly surprised when this one tasted completely different.

Most Verdejo wines are quite citrusy with lime and grapefruit flavours. This wine was more tropical with melon, ripe grapes and medium acidity giving it a refreshing finish.

In appearance it’s a clear pale lemon colour. It is a dry wine with little body and has a short finish. Not the most complex wine but incredibly easy to drink and a nice surprise for the price.