Roda: emblematic modern Rioja

27 Jul 2017

Bodegas Roda

Modern Rioja with a sense of history

Rioja is often classified into traditional and modern styles. While traditional Rioja is marked by long aging in older American oak, modern Rioja is defined by shorter aging in often new French barriques, and a more extracted style. Like most neat divisions, it breaks down on close analysis, but nevertheless Bodegas Roda is associated with the modern camp. It certainly isn't one of the historical bodegas; it was founded in 1986 by a married couple of wine merchants from Barcelona, Mario Rotllant and Carmen Daurella, who sought to create something special. They bought old vineyards across Rioja Alta, planted some new ones, and built a bodega on a hillside that could run on gravity-fed principles. Their use of only French oak seems to put them squarely in the modernist camp.

And yet there is much about Roda that speaks of a love of a tradition. That new bodega sits on top of a very old cellar, bang in the middle of Haro's station district where most of the oldest bodegas cluster. The vineyards Roda has sought out and acquired are made up of old bush vines of Rioja's traditional varieties. And while their wines when young may seem denser and more forceful, more defined by black fruit than one would expect from a 'traditional' Rioja, as they age they move unmistakably towards what is thought of as the traditional style.

While the founders have since divorced, winemaking continues seamlessly under Agustin Santolaya and his team, as evidenced by the plaudits and success the wines are accruing. Their Roda I is ripe, welcoming and forward in a warm vintage such as 2009, stunning, complex and barely ready to touch from the great 2004 vintage. Top of the Roda range is the Cirsion. Showy and voluptuous on the surface, but with layers and layers of flavour waiting below, and such fine tannins that it is very approachable from a young age, it has become one of Spain's emblematic modern Riojas. /NT

Offered subject to remaining unsold; available imminently