Usually when I mention journalists, it is because they have written something flattering about one of our wines, but not on this occasion. For the very first time I am making a post because I feel moved to disagree with a comment about a particular wine….. and it is not one of ours!

A real Dutch (flower) auction

I may be having deja-vu, or perhaps I’m just getting old and repeating myself, but it’s that time of year when we start the annual scramble to buy grapes. The phrase I have used in the past to describe our negotiation is a ‘Dutch auction’, but I have since realised that this might be a slight mis-use of the expression.

Strictly speaking a Dutch auction is where the auctioneer begins with a high asking price, which is then gradually lowered until a prospective customer eventually accepts the price on offer. This is not quite how it works in Galicia, so perhaps a more accurate expression might be free-for-all!

Whilst we are fortunate enough to have many very loyal grape suppliers, who sell to us year-on-year without too much argument, we still have to ensure that our scale of payment is adjusted to reflect the open market price. To supplement this we also incentivize our growers by paying on a sliding scale – the higher the quality, the more we pay.

In some cases however, this is not enough, especially in difficult years when grapes might be in short supply. Many unscrupulous growers simply sit on the fence, do not commit to any one Bodega, and wait until they achieve the very best price. Whilst I do understand this, and many will say that this is good business practice, it simply does not provide for good continuity, and merely serves to artificially inflate the market. More significantly for us this can have a knock-on effect on our final bottle price, and in the long-term can potentially damage the market for Albariño as a whole. Unfortunately these few ‘renegade’ growers refuse to accept this logic and therefore persist in causing grape prices to fluctuate.

As viticulturalist, our own in-house negotiator is Angela, and I have to admit that I really do not envy her in this task.

Little by little we strive to improve everything that we do, not only in the wine making department, but also in the image of our bodega as a whole.

Last year, you may recall, we refurbished the front of the bodega, and replaced the logo on the building with some rather smart new lettering. In keeping with this philosophy we decided that it was now time to upgrade our image on the roadside, and so we have just installed some rather attractive new roadsigns adjacent to the main road.

In keeping with Spanish tradition we first had to submit our plans not only to the local mayor’s office, but in turn to the local government office in Pontevedra, for rubber stamping. I think that the entire process (without exaggerating), took nearly a year to complete….. say no more.

It was only a day or so ago that I mentioned the traditions of our region, and the fact that rightly or wrongly, there are some habits that just don’t change no matter how little sense they appear to make.

Today’s topic is the timetable of holidays – not just here in Galicia, but throughout Spain, France and one or two other European countries…….. The mass exodus (and return) that takes place during the month of August, wreaking havoc on roads, as well as at many local and international airports.

In Spain this is compounded further by an even bigger curiosity – the apparent obsession with ‘quincenas’. Simply explained, the Spanish tend to take their breaks in fixed, fifteen day (quincena) blocks, either from 1st to 15th August, or 16th to 31st August. These fixed dates appear to be widely accepted by all, and it is rare that a traveller would journey either earlier or marginally later to avoid the rush.

Of course there are many compelling and perfectly logical reasons behind the big August break, but it does also have a few drawbacks.

In a business with a production line for example, it makes perfect sense to switch off the machines and send employees away for a month, thus getting the entire holiday allocation out of the way in one fail swoop. In addition, it is also extremely convenient if you have children at school and you are therefore obliged to go away during school holidays (albeit at greatly inflated prices).

In the case of a large, centrally located city such as Madrid, it is more a case of escaping the suffocating heat, which often exceeds 40°C at the height of summer. So yes, there are many good reasons for shutting up shop in August.

On the flipside, possibly the most serious downside to closing a business in August is the enforced disruption in supply to customers – obliging them to stock up on your particular product in advance of the closure. In the case of Castro Martin we do not close our doors at all, except that during the harvest period we ask our cusotmers to avoid placing orders where possible (for obvious, operational reasons).

Finally, and perhaps most significantly, there is the traffic, which for the reasons I have outlined above, tends to circulate en masse. Personally, I try to avoid crowds and queuing at all costs, but if I found myself sitting in stationary motorway traffic it would certainly take the gloss off any relaxing break, and only serve to restore my blood pressure back to it’s usual pre-holiday high!

It is with great interest that we hear on local media that the ‘official’ date of our harvest has already been decided…. a month before the actual event!

Now this comes as no great surprise to us, as in the past we have heard some incredulous tales of how the harvest date has allegedly been decided by some other Bodegas in our denomination. My personal favourite (rumour, it has to be admitted) was that one large Bodega employing it’s function rooms for weddings, decided that they would not start picking grapes until after the ‘wedding season’ had finished…. Nothing to do with the maturity of their grapes or the prevailing weather, simply that it fitted in with their wedding diary!

The fact that a date has now been broadcast on local TV (so far in advance) is perhaps an illustration of the ‘traditional’ approach that many in our region still apply to their winemaking. This serves to highlight just one of the differences between old world and new, whereby the new world approach to winemaking appears more scientific, and decidedly less haphazard. Having said that, there is no doubt that many of the more innovative Bodegas in our area now have a much more serious attitude, and indeed there are at least one or two that employ overseas wine makers.

Wouldn’t it be ironic if, after these comments, we did actually start on the 20th…… follow our blog in the coming weeks to find out.

Talking of statistics (as we were a few days ago), a recent survey has suggested that a very high percentage of those taking time off work claiming to have swine flu might not actually be telling the truth, and are simply taking advantage of this rather worrying pandemic.

Perhaps they are confusing the symptoms and have actually been afflicted by something quite different…… WINE FLU!!!

If you have over indulged a little, here are a couple of old remedies that you might care to try:

In Outer Mongolia, a pair of pickled sheeps eyes in tomato juice is thought to be the answer to a thumping headache, whilst cattle ropers in the Old West opted for tea brewed from rabbit droppings. In Ancient Rome, party-goers breakfasted on sheep lungs and two owl eggs and in Ancient Greece the cure was deep-fried canaries (although it was never specified if this was on or off-the-bone!)

For details of these recipes, please visit our main website.

Over the last couple of years, since I started our blog, I have always made mention of the Albariño Festival that takes place in the local town of Cambados at the end of July/start of August.

When writing this blog I often ask myself how many people are interested enough to read it, and if they do, whether they ever come back for a second visit.

Thanks to Google Analytics we are now able to find this information in amazing detail – the different countries that visit, how many pages they read, how long they stay online and what they had for breakfast…. (OK, so the last part is not true, but I did say lies and statistics!)