Who makes it
After studying oenology in Requena, César Márquez Pérez spent seven years working with his uncle Raúl Pérez. His apprenticeship began at Castro Ventosa and included helping Raúl Pérez launch La Vizcaína.
César Márquez Pérez launched his own project with the 2015 vintage in his hometown of Valtuille de Abajo, after restoring a building erected in the early 19th century that had once served as a wine cellar. In 2017, he took charge of the family cellar.
Where it grows
In the home village, the small plots called parajes contain mixtures of sand, clay, decomposed granite and stone. Their orientation and slope vary, and those differences yield widely differing characteristics. César Márquez Pérez owns under one hectare of vines in inherited family plots, plus half a hectare in San Juan de Paluezas.
What they make
His solo project explores a Burgundy inspired classification system in Bierzo. César Márquez Pérez focuses mainly on micro vinifications of old vine Godello and Mencía from parajes.
For the reds, Mencía grapes with some interplanted Garnacha Tintorera are partially destemmed and fermented in open barriques. After fermentation, the macerations are normally quite long. All wines spend 12 months in old barrels without racking or topping up before release the following winter.