Spain · La Mancha

DIONISIS AGRICULTURA BIOLOGICA / LA BODEGA DE LAS ESTRLLAS

Fifth-generation Valdepeñas estate farming 30 organic hectares outside any D.O., fermenting in clay tinajas with indigenous yeast and no additives.

The producer

Dionisio de Nova is the fifth generation of a farming family rooted in Valdepeñas, in the southern half of Castilla-La Mancha. The family has grown grapes and made wine continuously since the mid-nineteenth century. When Dionisio returned in 1996 after studying agricultural engineering in Barcelona and joining the first organic farming movement group in Spain, he converted the entire bodega to ecological production from the ground up: 30 hectares farmed without synthetic inputs, fermentation in clay tinajas with indigenous yeast, no sulfites, no filtration, and the lunar calendar guiding both vineyard and cellar work. The EGO Vinum range was built to hold those choices, and it sits outside the Valdepeñas D.O., labelled as vinos de la tierra.

The EGO Vinum range includes EGO Vinum Ancestral Rosado, a 100% Tempranillo pétillant naturel bottled before fermentation finishes, so the remaining sugar completes its work in bottle and traps natural CO2. It is a nacreous, pearlescent pink with fine continuous bubbles, a nose of fresh wild strawberry and dried rose petal, and a palate that is soft and gently sweet, with the clean acidity of Tempranillo keeping the finish lively. In a region historically defined by high-volume red wine production, it is a precise and personal statement.

Known for

Ancestral-method Tempranillo rosado, clay tinaja fermentation, certified organic production outside D.O.

Notable facts

The story

Bread, wine and sugar at five years old

Dionisio de Nova was five years old the first time he drank wine. In the afternoons in Valdepeñas, his family gave him bread, wine and sugar: a small glass, diluted, sweetened, the way families in the region had fed children for generations. He remembers the ritual clearly. Decades later, after studying agricultural engineering in Barcelona and joining the first organic farming movement in Spain, he came back to the same house and the same vineyards and made wine without a single additive, fermented in the same clay tinajas his family had used before him. He did not add sulfites, did not filter, did not adjust the fermentation with commercial yeast. The child who drank bread, wine and sugar at five grew up to make a wine that is still a little sweet, still fizzing gently in the glass, still made in clay.

From the atlas

DIONISIS AGRICULTURA BIOLOGICA / LA BODEGA DE LAS ESTRLLAS

At A Glance

Producer: La Bodega de las Estrellas Country: Spain Region: Castilla-La Mancha Town: Valdepeñas, Ciudad Real Grapes: Tempranillo Farming: 100% certified organic, 30 hectares Fermentation: Clay tinajas (amphorae) with indigenous yeast Labels: Vinos de la tierra (outside D.O.) Range: EGO Vinum

The Producer

Dionisio de Nova is the fifth generation of a farming family rooted in Valdepeñas, in the southern half of Castilla-La Mancha. The family has grown grapes and made wine continuously since the mid-nineteenth century. When Dionisio took charge in 1996, he converted the entire bodega to ecological production, removed sulfites and filtration from the winemaking process, and began fermenting every wine in clay tinajas with indigenous yeast. The wine range he built around those choices is called EGO Vinum, and it sits outside any D.O. framework, labelled as vinos de la tierra.

What makes the estate unusual is not simply the organic certification, but the convergence of methods: clay vessels that predate oak barrels in Spanish wine history, yeasts cultivated from the vineyard itself, the lunar calendar applied to both vineyard management and cellar work, and a refusal to intervene with additives at any point in production. Those commitments have been in place for thirty years.

Place

Valdepeñas sits in the southern reaches of Castilla-La Mancha, in Ciudad Real province, on a flat, sun-baked plateau that has produced large volumes of red wine for most of the twentieth century. The D.O. Valdepeñas appellation built its reputation on high-yield Tempranillo and the kind of output that filled bulk markets across Spain and abroad. La Bodega de las Estrellas operates on 30 hectares within that landscape but deliberately outside the D.O. system, classifying its wines as vinos de la tierra, a category that allows independent growers to bottle under their own rules rather than conform to appellation specifications.

Choosing to remain outside the D.O. has a direct consequence on the label: no appellation name, no classification hierarchy, and no obligation to meet yield or cellar standards that the producer considers incompatible with organic farming. The freedom is also a statement. In a region defined by volume, La Bodega de las Estrellas produces small quantities with no additives and markets itself as a vigneron operation rather than a commercial bodega.

Soil And Site

The 30 hectares are farmed organically, with no synthetic inputs. The vineyards sit on the plateau soils typical of southern Castilla-La Mancha: calcareous, with significant clay content and low organic matter. The continental climate brings extreme heat in summer, cold winters, and very low annual rainfall, conditions that naturally limit vine vigour and concentrate flavour in the grapes. The combination of calcareous soil and low water availability pushes Tempranillo toward thicker skins and lower yields than in wetter growing regions, which matters for the rosado style the estate specialises in.

Story

Dionisio de Nova left Valdepeñas for Barcelona in the late 1970s to study agricultural engineering. In Barcelona he joined the first organised organic agriculture movement group in Spain, at a point when ecological farming was a fringe position in Spanish viticulture. He spent years studying and working before returning to the family bodega in 1996. When he returned, he did not inherit a going concern and make small adjustments. He converted the entire operation to ecological production from the ground up.

The conversion meant removing pesticides and synthetic fertilisers from 30 hectares, which takes years to certify and longer to fully stabilise. It also meant rebuilding the cellar philosophy: clay tinajas instead of stainless steel or oak, wild fermentation from indigenous yeast rather than commercial strains, and no sulfites or filtering at bottling. The EGO Vinum label was created to hold those choices, and the ancestral rosado became the wine that most clearly expressed them. A pétillant naturel Tempranillo bottled with live fermentation and no intervention is an unusual product from a region historically associated with straightforward, oak-influenced reds.

The estate does not belong to the Valdepeñas D.O. That independence was a deliberate outcome of the 1996 conversion. The D.O. rules and the ecological, additive-free approach were not compatible, so the bodega walked away from the appellation and has remained outside it.

Vineyards And Cellar

The 30 hectares are farmed without synthetic chemistry, and vineyard timing follows the lunar calendar, a practice associated with biodynamic viticulture in which planting, pruning, harvesting, and racking are aligned with lunar phases. The belief behind the practice is that lunar cycles affect soil moisture, sap movement, and fermentation behaviour. Whether or not that causal claim is measurable, every cellar and vineyard decision follows the lunar calendar.

Fermentation happens exclusively in clay tinajas, the traditional Spanish earthenware vessels used for wine storage and fermentation long before oak barrels became standard in Spanish cellars. Tinajas are porous, allowing very gentle micro-oxygenation without the flavour extraction of oak. They maintain low, stable temperatures during fermentation and do not impose any wood character on the wine. Fermentation runs on indigenous yeast drawn from the vineyard itself, with no commercial yeast additions. Temperatures are kept low throughout. The wines are bottled without filtration and without sulfites.

For the ancestral rosado, the tinaja fermentation is stopped before completion. The wine goes into bottle while a small measure of residual sugar remains. The remaining sugar ferments in bottle, and the CO2 produced stays trapped, creating the fine, continuous natural carbonation that distinguishes the ancestral method from conventional sparkling wine production.

Wines

The EGO Vinum range is compact, built entirely around Tempranillo, and unified by clay amphora fermentation, indigenous yeast, and a no-additive philosophy.

EGO Vinum Ancestral Rosado: 100% Tempranillo, produced by the ancestral method (also called pétillant naturel). Fermentation begins in clay tinajas and continues in bottle, trapping natural CO2. No filtration, no sulfites. The wine is salmon-pink with a nacreous, pearlescent colour that catches light differently from conventional still or sparkling rosados. The mousse is fine and persistent rather than aggressive. Wild strawberry and fresh floral notes on the nose; soft, gently sweet on the palate with a light, friendly finish.

EGO Vinum Blanco de Tinto: a rosé-style wine from Tempranillo, noted for wide food versatility. Produced under the same no-additive, clay tinaja framework as the ancestral rosado, but without the pétillant character. Specific sensory detail beyond the food-pairing description is limited in the available record.

Both wines are labelled as vinos de la tierra rather than under a D.O. appellation name.

In The Glass

The EGO Vinum Ancestral Rosado is where all the production decisions become visible. It opens with a pale, nacreous pink, a colour that reads almost iridescent in a clear glass. Fine bubbles rise continuously from the base, slower and smaller than in Champagne or Cava, which comes from natural in-bottle fermentation rather than pressurised dosage.

The nose is fresh and lightly floral, carrying wild strawberry, a little dried rose petal, and the clean, faintly earthy note that clay fermentation tends to preserve in a wine. There is no oak, no vanillin, no toasty or smoky character.

In the mouth, the wine is soft and gently round. The residual sugar is present but not heavy: it gives the wine a light, approachable sweetness balanced by the natural acidity of Tempranillo and by the CO2 that keeps the texture lively. The finish is short and friendly rather than complex, with a faint fruit echo and clean acidity. This is a wine for a warm afternoon or a table of food, not a wine for extended contemplation.

A Bottle To Understand It

Start with EGO Vinum Ancestral Rosado. It is 100% Tempranillo, fermented in clay tinajas with indigenous yeast, bottled with live fermentation still running, and sealed with the remaining sugar and natural gas intact. No filtration, no sulfites, no intervention after bottling. The nacreous pink colour and the slow-rising fine bubbles make it immediately unlike a conventionally made sparkling rosé. In the glass it is soft and lightly sweet, with wild strawberry and a clean floral lift, and the mousse is gentle enough to drink alongside food rather than before it. It is the wine that concentrates every choice the estate makes: the tinaja, the wild yeast, the organic grapes, the refusal to add or remove anything at the end. One bottle explains what La Bodega de las Estrellas is doing and why it sits outside the Valdepeñas D.O.

Anecdote

Dionisio de Nova was five years old the first time he drank wine. In the afternoons in Valdepeñas, his family gave him bread, wine and sugar: a small glass, diluted, sweetened, the way families in the region had fed children for generations. He remembers the ritual clearly. Decades later, after studying agricultural engineering in Barcelona and joining the first organic farming movement in Spain, he came back to the same house and the same vineyards and made wine without a single additive, fermented in the same clay tinajas his family had used before him. He did not add sulfites, did not filter, did not adjust the fermentation with commercial yeast. The child who drank bread, wine and sugar at five grew up to make a wine that is still a little sweet, still fizzing gently in the glass, still made in clay.

Final Word

La Bodega de las Estrellas is a small, specific operation: one grower, one family history, thirty organic hectares in a region better known for volume, and a wine range built on clay amphorae and lunar calendars. The wines are not aspirational in the Valdepeñas D.O. sense. They are honest products of a particular set of convictions held consistently since 1996. The EGO Vinum Ancestral Rosado is the clearest expression of those convictions in a glass.

Sources

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