The winemaker who has put not one, but two Spanish regions onto the fine wine map.

A scion of the famous Palacios family in Rioja, you might have expected Alvaro to have continued making wine in the same way and place that his family had been doing for generations. But young Alvaro had other ideas. After studying oenology in Bordeaux and working at Chateau Petrus, he struck out on his own in search of old vines and perfect terroir. He found what he was looking for in southern Catalonia on the rocky hillsides of Priorat, an area where winemaking seemed to be in terminal decline, and began to re-cultivate old, local Garnacha and Samso vines. Critical acclaim rolled in, and the super-cuvee L'Ermita was soon commanding stratospheric prices.

Other winemakers might have relaxed at this point, but Alvaro once again set off in search of old, characterful terroirs. This time, working with his nephew Ricardo, he settled on Bierzo in north-western Spain, never hitherto an area known for fine wines. Over lunch in London last month, Alvaro told me that what he had sought in Priorat and found again in Bierzo was a region with great terroir and a heritage of monastic winemaking. Just as in Burgundy, religious institutions spent centuries discovering the best vineyard sites. Eschewing international grape varieties, Alvaro and Ricardo cultivated the local Mencia. As in Priorat, they chose to farm biodynamically, and have shown that with the right treatment Mencia can produce powerful, structured, perfumed wines with a long cellar life. /NT