1976 R. Lopéz de Heredia Viña
Tondonia Rioja Gran Reserva

&nbsp;The 1976
Viña Tondonia Rioja Gran Reserva is a wine of great clarity and finesse, with a
very long, ethereal finish featuring fully resolved tannins and an impression
of weightlessness.

Medium
red, with a browning edge. A crumbling cork set off alarm bells but one whiff
of this elixir and my fears dissipated. Multifaceted perfume of cherry,
strawberry, plum, dried rose, black olive, pepper and celery seed, along with
balsamic and leather nuances and a touch of incipient maderization. Wonderfully
silky on entry, but with strong integrated acidity giving the mid-palate an
almost electric impression of vinosity. Still presents some very fresh
strawberry and raspberry fruit after 39 years, along with the deeper, more
decadent notes of smoky underbrush, leather and coffee grounds. A wine of great
clarity and finesse, with a very long, ethereal finish featuring fully resolved
tannins and an impression of weightlessness. At or just past its peak, this is
a wine of outstanding energy and class. It would make an amazing partner to
suckling lamb.

Great gran reservas, made
by the most traditional Rioja producers in only the best years (Lopéz de
Heredia was founded in 1877), spend years in barrel and bodega prior to being
released.&nbsp; While in theory they are then
ready to drink, the best of these wines can continue to age magnificently in a
cold cellar, gaining in texture and depth and taking on tertiary aromas while
somehow maintaining their treble notes of red fruits and dried flowers. I first
tasted this Rioja in the damp, spooky, cobwebbed cellar of Lopéz de Heredia in
1993, and this bottle, opened this past weekend, seemed barely a few years
older.

The Viña Tondonia comes from Lopéz
de Heredia’s most famous vineyard, planted along the Ebro river on alluvial
clay soil with a high limestone content. While this bodega’s Viña
Bosconia Gran Reserva is generally thicker and sweeter (it comes in a Burgundy-shaped
bottle) and the Tondonia more claret-like (done in a Bordeaux bottle), I’ve
always found the ‘76 Tondonia fresher and
richer than its sibling. 94/Drink
Now.

-- Stephen Tanzer

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