Martúe, Vino de Pago in Toledo, Spain

Juancho Llovet, from Europa Plus, and I visited Bodegas Martúe on November 15th, 2024 with the objective of learning about this winery that had been identified in a reputed Spanish newpaper as a “Vino de Pago” with an excellent quality / price ratio .

The visit was arranged through Marta Rodriguez, Bodegas Martúe’s head of ecotourism, who was a pleasure to deal with.  Jorge Miranda, head of international sales, was our host and provided most of the information collected in this post.  Thank you, Marta and Jorge!

The town of La Guardia sits on a plateau overlooking a wide expanse of the western part of Toledo province. Its church of Nuestra Señora de la Asunción is a landmark that can be seen from far away.  See a picture of the church from the bodega’s olive grove:

Bodega Martúe is built at the edge of the plateau, just outside town.  The valley resulted from the sinkage of land caused by tectonic plates movement and became a salty lake.  Over time, the lake dried out and the minerality remained in the soil. The following picture from the natural balcony in the back of the Bodega shows the Plateau of Ocaña and the valley framed by pine and olive trees.

The following pictures show de valley where the pago is located.  The vineyards cover a good part of that land:

This is what a sample of the soil looked like in my hand.  The light color limestone rocks are very porous and break down in winter when the water that permeates them freezes. I took one of these little rocks as a souvenir:

In the following video Jorge Miranda, explains the origin and characteristics of the soil.  It was a very windy day and that significantly impacts the quality of the sound.  However, you can follow the dialogue through close captions.

As a summary, the soil is clay-based with a high content of limestone and high minerality.  The surroundings are covered with pine trees, olive trees and Mediterranean herbs.  The average elevation is approximately 670 meters (2,200 ft).  It’s dry out there with average annual precipitation of 412 mm (16.4 inches) and humidity around 30% in July and August.  There is a very large differential in Summer day temperature between extremely hot and sunny days and cooler nights.  My own calculations (based on a given years range) of Growing Degree Days versus Sun Exposure during the growing season result in a climate type closer to Jumilla than to Northern Castille.  See chart below:

That places this pago between Viticultural Areas IV and V out of five or, in other words, hot. 

The pago vineyards are distributed between the 74 acres of Finca Campo Martuela and the 125 acres of Finca El Casar. As we can see in the map, the French varietals have significant presence in the pago. 

They, combined with the local Tempranillo, afford Martúe the possibility of creating complex blends of up to 5 varietals.  After some trials and optimization throughout years of work Martúe has arrived at the blend of its main wine whose 2021 vintage was crafted with 28% Petit Verdot, 22% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Syrah, 11% Tempranillo, 11% Merlot and 8% Malbec.  Viticulture follows organic practices with harvesting mostly at night.  Natural fermentation with indigenous yeast follows. 

The following pictures show the beautiful entrance to the winery, a tastefully decorated waiting room and, finally, the 10-meter-deep cellar: 

In the following video Jorge provides some interesting data about Bodegas Martúe’s cellar:

And then, we proceeded to taste Martúe’s wines. We started with Martúe 2021 which is their main wine in terms of volume.  You will be able to hear our impressions in the following video:

This wine had aromas of red cherries, cranberries, geranium, paprika and, above all, wet soil with Mediterranean herbs, including lavender.  As Jorge put it: It reminded him of the smell of their land after rain.  He seemed very proud of that because in a vino de pago you want to express your terroir.  Once at home, tasting a bottle with more time, I could confirm the aromas that we had described and add my impressions about the mouthfeel.  The wine had full body in a thick structure with powdery tannins and the right acidity level.  Jorge confirmed that Martúe does not use any tartaric additives to correct the acidity and achieves it through the harvest timing and blend.  I tasted the same bottle throughout 3 days and I can attest that it was totally drinkable and enjoyable the third day showing only minimal signs of oxidation.  The heavy load of tannins protected this wine and confirmed my initial impression that it could be cellared and age well for 5 or even 10 years.  This wine could have withstood more than its 10 months of French oak aging.

That was their main wine in terms of brand and production.  However, in special vintages, their winemaker produces the Martúe Especial.  We tried the 2018.  Our impressions are provided in the following video:

And my tasting once at home a few days after the visit follows:  Aromas of cassis, dark cherries, Mediterranean garrigue (including thyme), fennel and deep bouquet of vanilla and croissant followed by cigar and powerful mocha.  Once the mocha made appearance, it remained.  In mouth it was filling and fulfilling with pleasant acidity keeping alive a pasty structure with partially evolved but still very persistent dusty tannins.  Almost chewy.  Ample and clean aftertaste.  A powerful and expressive wine that will surely improve by mildening up with additional bottle aging.  Ready to drink now but better to keep for 5 to 10 years.  The characteristics of this wine keep faithful to Martúe’s style choice with heavily roasted French oak barrels.  I wonder what would happen if the barrels had lighter roast.

As Jorge explains in the following video, Martúe followed Spanish pioneer Marqués de Griñón with the Syrah varietal.  The experiment has resulted in such a success that Syrah has become the only mono-varietal wine of this winery. The following video shows a conversation we had about Syrah and other related matters:

And we finally tasted the Martúe Syrah 2020 with the following results:

I used my sensorial memory and went quickly through Australia, the US West Coast and the Upper Côtes du Rhône to determine what would have been my guess in a blind tasting.  I had problems doing that at the winery.  However, a few days later, in an objective environment, I ended up closing my eyes and seeing myself in the Central Valley of California, near Sacramento, perhaps Lodi..

As a summary, the visit was a very enjoyable experience.  We appreciated Jorge’s hospitality and relished on the affordable yet powerful and expressive wines from Bodegas Martúe.

Bodegas Martúe has invested in Blanco Nieva in the D. O. Rueda.  We tasted their white wines but should include that tasting in a potentially future visit to that winery.  We appreciated the opportunity to enjoy them.

We went for lunch to Restaurante El Madero.  A typical road restaurant with decent food.  We enjoyed the regional dish “Migas Gachas”.  We ordered Martúe 2021, indeed.  I would recommend it but make sure up front what the price of your order is going to be.  The really exceptional food was the “croquetas” from Bodegas Martue’s cook.

And for the persons interested about what vino de pago means, let me provide the following description. Spain has 4 main classifications of quality wine, as follows:

• Indicación Geográfica Protegida (IGP) – Simplifying, this would be equivalent to Italian IGP.

• Denominación de Origen (DO) – Equivalent to French Appellation d’Origine and American Viticultural Area (AVA).

• Denominación de Origen Calificada (DOCa) – Only La Rioja and Priorat have achieved it to date.  DOCa needs to have been in a DO for at least 10 years, implement quality control traceability at production lot level, and some restrictive geographical and viticultural requirements.

• Vino de Pago is a relatively new classification that applies to wines made by a winery from its vineyards according to very strict requirements being the main one that the fruits are all sourced from a “Pago” (a specific piece of land with defined terroir characteristics such as weather, soil, and elevation).  This is trying to emulate Burgundy’s Grand Cru.  There are only a few tens of wineries with this certification so far.

Bodegas Martúe goes through a lot of effort to maintain the Vino de Pago certification but the results show up and demonstrate that it is the right way to go.

And here we go with our final toast:

Bodegas Martúe exports 40% of its production.  If you want to get their wine in the US, the importer is De Maison Selections.