Vino FiguraBaja California’s Valle de Guadalupe is bubbling with young winemaking talent and collaborative energy. One of the leading lights of this new avant-garde is the young, forward-thinking Daniel Erasmo Kelly, or just “Kelly” for short if you’re a friend or a local.
Kelly grew up in a family of wine drinkers during the Guadalupe Valley’s recent wine boom. After earning a culinary degree, he gravitated back to wine, taking a job as a cellar hand in 2015. Learning the technical aspects of winemaking became his passion. Likening winemaking to any other artistic pursuit, Kelly sees it as a skill learned over time and with repeated practice. He subsequently traveled the world apprenticing at wineries in New Zealand, Chile and Oregon including stints studying biodynamics, all the while honing his expertise in the cellar. Eventually, Kelly came back to his native Guadalupe, starting his project Figura (“shape” in Spanish) as a collaboration with small-scale growers who work with old vines organically. Over the last several years, Kelly has been able to maintain relationships with his grower collaborators, helping them navigate the often-times hot and inhospitable conditions of grape growing in the Valle de Guadalupe, as well as the more off-the-beaten-path San Vicente Valley, an hour south of Ensenada. He also helps make the wines at his wife Silvana’s family property, the historic Pijoan winery. Kelly’s goal is to make wines that develop over time, to tell the story of the place where they grow and to give voice to the old vines of his area. To this end, Kelly harvests by hand, transporting the grapes to the winery as quickly as possible to cool down over a 24 hour period to preserve aromatics and slow down fermentation. The wines are then racked and cold settled over a couple days, with fermentations starting spontaneously with native yeasts. The wines see a short elevage and then one final racking before being bottled with just 10ppm of added SO2. The results are precise “wines of nature” and some of the most exciting we have tasted out of Baja California. You will find Kelly and his like-minded producer colleagues from the Valle de Guadalupe putting on tastings and showing their wares from Mexico City to Guadalajara to Tijuana, bringing the progressive spirit of collaboration and natural winemaking to wine drinkers across México and beyond. The Wines
Fractura Blanco is made of 90% Colombard from Abel Bibayoff Vineyard planted during the 1970s, and 10% Moscatel from the newly planted Emiliano Ibarra Vineyard, both on sandy clay soils in the hills northeast of Ensenada. The grapes were harvested on the same day with the intention of co-fermenting, therefore the Colombard is slightly less acidic and the Moscatel slightly riper. After the grapes arrive at the winery they spend the first 24 hours in the cold room, to help preserve aromatics and slow down primary fermentation. The next day all grapes are direct-pressed with a basket press into stainless steel tanks to settle for 1-2 days, then racked into neutral French 225L barrels for alcoholic and malolactic fermentation. After 8-10 months the wine is racked back into tank for a final settling of sediment, and bottled unfined, unfiltered and with only 10ppm SO2 addition.
Fractura Rosado is 100% Durif from the Olegario Sandoval Vineyard planted during the 1980s, close to a stream on sandy loam soils in the hills northeast of Ensenada. The grapes were harvested all in one day. After the grapes arrive at the winery they spend the first 24 hours in the cold room, to help preserve aromatics and slow down primary fermentation. The next day the grapes are direct-pressed with a basket press into stainless steel tanks to settle for 1-2 days, then racked into neutral French 225L barrels for alcoholic and malolactic fermentation. After 8-10 months the wine is racked back into tank for a final settling of sediment, and bottled unfined, unfiltered and with only 10ppm SO2 addition. Fractura Tinto is 85% Syrah and 15% Viognier from the Santos Gallardo Vineyard planted during the late 1960s on loamy clay soils with rich minerality, around 200m elevation an hour’s drive south of Ensenada. The grapes were harvested all in one day to ensure a complete co-fermentation. After the grapes arrive at the winery they spend the first 24 hours in the cold room, to help preserve aromatics and slow down primary fermentation. The next day the grapes are 50-70% destemmed with the remainder whole cluster, and combined into stainless steel tanks for primary fermentation with daily pump-overs. After 2-3 weeks, the wine is racked into neutral French 225L barrels for malolactic fermentation and raised an additional 4-6 months in barrel. The finished wine is racked back into tank for a final settling of sediment, and bottled unfined, unfiltered and with only 10ppm SO2 addition. Fig. 3 is 100% Chardonnay from the Crespo Family Vineyard planted in the late 1990s on sandy loam soils with a little clay in the hills southeast of Ensenada. The grapes were harvested by hand and spent the first 24 hours in the cold room to help preserve aromatics and slow down primary fermentation. The next day all grapes were direct-pressed with a basket press into stainless steel tanks to settle for 1-2 days, then racked into new and used 500L & 225L French oak barrels for alcoholic and malolactic fermentation. After 8-12 months the wine was racked back to tank for blending and a final settling of sediment, and bottled unfined, unfiltered and with only 10ppm SO2 addition. Fig. 5 is 85% Sauvignon Blanc and 15% Viognier from Antonio Moreno’s vineyard in San Antonio de Las Minas, planted in 2010 on sandy clay soils near the foothills and away from the main ruta del vino. The grapes were harvested by hand and spent the first 24 hours in the cold room to help preserve aromatics and slow down primary fermentation. The next day all grapes were destemmed and transferred into stainless steel tanks for alcoholic fermentation, with daily pump-overs throughout the 2-3 weeks on skins. After primary is almost complete, the wine was gently pressed into neutral 500L & 225L French oak barrels for malolactic fermentation and aging on fine lees for 8-10 months. The finished wine was racked back to tank for blending and a final settling of sediment, and bottled unfined, unfiltered and with only 10ppm SO2 addition. Cochinero is mostly Grenache along with Misión, Rosa del Peru, and Palomino. About 50% of the grapes are ungrafted Grenache sourced from Olegario Sandoval’s vineyard in the Calafia sub-region of the Valle, planted in the 1960s on sandy loam with a little clay. The other half of the fruit is a field blend of ungrafted and dry-farmed bush vine Grenache and friends sourced from the Pro Vi.Va Vineyard in El Porvenir, planted in 1980 on sandy & silty soils. The grapes were harvested by hand and spent the first 24 hours in the cold room to help preserve aromatics and slow down primary fermentation. The grapes were all fermented in a variety of small vessels (open-top barrel, open-top stainless steel tank, and open-top plastic vat) with some direct-press, some semi-carbonic maceration, and some crushed with one week maceration. After primary fermentation completed, all was blended and aged in neutral oak barrels for 6-10 months before being bottled unfined, unfiltered and with only 10ppm SO2 addition. |
LocationGeneral Info
Tech SheetsGallery |
