How to toast in 2023: three wines and a lot of history

2023-01-01T05:10:28.157Z

With less money to spend, the logical thing to do is to choose better. Perhaps this is the year to explore and venture into new places and flavors.

According to IWSR, a market research firm specializing in beverages, the current economic context is leading to moderating consumption and buying more selectively.

Its report for the last quarter of 2022, with data from 17 markets on five continents, including Spain, warns that European consumers are already significantly reducing the amount of money they allocate to this item.

Paradoxically, and as far as wine is concerned, Spain has never drunk better nor has there been so much to choose from.

Recent years have not only seen the resurgence of forgotten terroirs and grape varieties, but also the incorporation of a new generation of well-travelled, educated producers more inclined to share experiences and knowledge.

In the age of communication, technology has brought those who make wine into contact with those who enjoy it;

trends are more global than ever, but despite this, diversity continues to grow.

Although a small part of all this is timidly beginning to reach the supermarket shelves, the experience is much more complete if one looks into that world in which wine is almost a lifestyle: a hobby, a topic of conversation, a travel engine. and holidays, the axis of leisure and social life... The breeding ground is in bars and specialized stores, restaurants that take care of wine, clubs that accompany the curious on their initiation journey through wine styles and regions, or in non-professional tastings. each time with more casual overtones that just as well end up in a country party that is finished off with live music.

Approaching the wine culture only requires an open mind.

When the

master of wine

Pedro Ballesteros says that there is no more unfaithful aficionado in the world, it is because the offer is so wide and changing (each year a new vintage arrives with its own characteristics) that it is virtually incomprehensible.

Loyalty to the brand of consumers in the past is naturally cracking due to the boiling point that Spanish wine is experiencing (none of the recent crises has stopped the creation of new brands and projects) and due to the increasing introduction of foreign labels, perhaps without too much quantitative weight, but very present in fan circles.

Although every wine lover has his favorites list, exploration and discovery are part of his DNA.

In this small world, wines have names and surnames.

They are not riojas, riberas, albariños or champagnes without more.

They come from specific places, they bear the signature of people who have cultivated and/or elaborated these grapes so that they transmit the flavor of a place, of a variety, of a whim of the weather or of the yeasts, or to be able to reach a different dimension. from the mixture of diverse elements.

The starting point is a landscape shaped by the weather and the hand of man.

Then it's time to wallow in the difference: the sharp acidity of the coldest regions, the austerity of continental climates, the opulence and generosity of the Mediterranean...

On this trip it is good to have guides.

They are found in all those places mentioned above, on pages like these and also, like everything nowadays, within reach of a click.

You just have to put the

hashtag #winelover

on Instagram to start browsing.

And, of course, the road is much more pleasant with fellow fans with whom to share the contents of the bottle and, very important in these times, the bill.

Some ideas to get going range from remembering to try a wine from the next place you visit or organizing a regular gathering of friends who share the same interest to signing up for a tasting at a nearby wine shop or bar.

Almost without realizing it, one can go from absentmindedly uncorking a bottle with the sole purpose of having a liquid companion on the table to giving it a little more attention, dwelling on its flavor and learning the story behind it.

The enjoyment is greatly amplified when you go beyond the act of drinking to live and share the wine.