Last Sunday Angela and I experienced a most unusual, unexpected, but highly enjoyable lunch – where else but at our favourite restaurant, Pepe Vieira. The original purpose of our visit was for business, to discuss a forthcoming function. However, as time passed, lunchtime approached, and so quite naturally, we decided to stay for a bite to eat……. but there was a problem. The restaurant was fully booked! Our friend, and co-owner of the restaurant Xosé Cannas immediately offered us a solution – the Chef’s table. A table in the kitchen, virtually adjoining the hotplate and overlooking the whole operation. Being a frustrated chef myself, this was my idea of food heaven – great dishes on my plate with a ringside seat watching exactly how they were put together.

Having started my career in the hotel trade, I know exactly how loud and animated a kitchen can be during service, but I have to confess that Xosé’s domain was simply the epitome of calm and professionalism. Everyone in their corner, knowing exactly what was expected of them, and producing some great food. No fuss, no shouting or swearing. Gordon Ramsay would certainly have felt out of place in this kitchen – definitely not a nightmare!

We had arrived at 12.30am,  and eventually left about 4 hours later. A bit longer than we had anticipated, but altogether a very memorable Sunday lunch, and as always, highly recommended.

Last Sunday Angela and I experienced a most unusual, unexpected, but highly enjoyable lunch – where else but at our favourite restaurant, Pepe Vieira. The original purpose of our visit was for business, to discuss a forthcoming function. However, as time passed, lunchtime approached, and so quite naturally, we decided to stay for a bite to eat……. but there was a problem. The restaurant was fully booked! Our friend, and co-owner of the restaurant Xosé Cannas immediately offered us a solution – the Chef’s table. A table in the kitchen, virtually adjoining the hotplate and overlooking the whole operation. Being a frustrated chef myself, this was my idea of food heaven – great dishes on my plate with a ringside seat watching exactly how they were put together.

Having started my career in the hotel trade, I know exactly how loud and animated a kitchen can be during service, but I have to confess that Xosé’s domain was simply the epitome of calm and professionalism. Everyone in their corner, knowing exactly what was expected of them, and producing some great food. No fuss, no shouting or swearing. Gordon Ramsay would certainly have felt out of place in this kitchen – definitely not a nightmare!

We had arrived at 12.30am,  and eventually left about 4 hours later. A bit longer than we had anticipated, but altogether a very memorable Sunday lunch, and as always, highly recommended.

Last Sunday Angela and I experienced a most unusual, unexpected, but highly enjoyable lunch – where else but at our favourite restaurant, Pepe Vieira. The original purpose of our visit was for business, to discuss a forthcoming function. However, as time passed, lunchtime approached, and so quite naturally, we decided to stay for a bite to eat……. but there was a problem. The restaurant was fully booked! Our friend, and co-owner of the restaurant Xosé Cannas immediately offered us a solution – the Chef’s table. A table in the kitchen, virtually adjoining the hotplate and overlooking the whole operation. Being a frustrated chef myself, this was my idea of food heaven – great dishes on my plate with a ringside seat watching exactly how they were put together.

Having started my career in the hotel trade, I know exactly how loud and animated a kitchen can be during service, but I have to confess that Xosé’s domain was simply the epitome of calm and professionalism. Everyone in their corner, knowing exactly what was expected of them, and producing some great food. No fuss, no shouting or swearing. Gordon Ramsay would certainly have felt out of place in this kitchen – definitely not a nightmare!

We had arrived at 12.30am,  and eventually left about 4 hours later. A bit longer than we had anticipated, but altogether a very memorable Sunday lunch, and as always, highly recommended.

Last Sunday Angela and I experienced a most unusual, unexpected, but highly enjoyable lunch – where else but at our favourite restaurant, Pepe Vieira. The original purpose of our visit was for business, to discuss a forthcoming function. However, as time passed, lunchtime approached, and so quite naturally, we decided to stay for a bite to eat……. but there was a problem. The restaurant was fully booked! Our friend, and co-owner of the restaurant Xosé Cannas immediately offered us a solution – the Chef’s table. A table in the kitchen, virtually adjoining the hotplate and overlooking the whole operation. Being a frustrated chef myself, this was my idea of food heaven – great dishes on my plate with a ringside seat watching exactly how they were put together.

Having started my career in the hotel trade, I know exactly how loud and animated a kitchen can be during service, but I have to confess that Xosé’s domain was simply the epitome of calm and professionalism. Everyone in their corner, knowing exactly what was expected of them, and producing some great food. No fuss, no shouting or swearing. Gordon Ramsay would certainly have felt out of place in this kitchen – definitely not a nightmare!

We had arrived at 12.30am,  and eventually left about 4 hours later. A bit longer than we had anticipated, but altogether a very memorable Sunday lunch, and as always, highly recommended.

We have enjoyed two or three mentions in the U.S. press recently, which means that we must at least be doing something right. Our latest mention was possibly the briefest that we have ever had, but in terms of circulation, it is also one of the biggest. The U.S. Weekly magazine – I am told that this is a celebrity/gossip magazine and is similar to People, albeit I must confess that I am not really familiar with either. Spain is of course, the birthplace of Hola (Hello) magazine, and so quite naturally, we are more than familiar with celebrity gossip! So, if it’s good enough for the Kardashians, then it must be good enough for Castro Martin!

Oh, and by the way, U.S. Weekly described our wine as “brightly acidic”…. short, and to the point.

We have enjoyed two or three mentions in the U.S. press recently, which means that we must at least be doing something right. Our latest mention was possibly the briefest that we have ever had, but in terms of circulation, it is also one of the biggest. The U.S. Weekly magazine – I am told that this is a celebrity/gossip magazine and is similar to People, albeit I must confess that I am not really familiar with either. Spain is of course, the birthplace of Hola (Hello) magazine, and so quite naturally, we are more than familiar with celebrity gossip! So, if it’s good enough for the Kardashians, then it must be good enough for Castro Martin!

Oh, and by the way, U.S. Weekly described our wine as “brightly acidic”…. short, and to the point.

In the years that I have had my car, the only damage that I have ever suffered has been caused by other people…… whilst my car has been parked! And, of course, not one person has come forward to admit any sort of liability. Door dinks, bumps and a couple of scratches, all from car parks.

At Castro Martin we are quite fortunate that when Angela’s father built the Bodega over 30 years ago, he had the foresight to include a loading area for trucks, and also a generous area for parking. Until now this was simply an open area of concrete, and parking was simply a free-for-all – you parked your car where you could squeeze it in (and with Angela around, that was never going to be the best arrangement – for vehicle safety purposes). Suffice to say that she has a bit of a reputation for bumping into things, and suffers horribly from walls and posts that have a habit of reversing out in front of her!

Anyway, after painting an exterior wall the other day, we had a bit of white paint left over, and decided to paint some ‘official’ parking bays. We have made sure that each space is very generous so that even Angela has no excuse for causing any door dinks!!

In the years that I have had my car, the only damage that I have ever suffered has been caused by other people…… whilst my car has been parked! And, of course, not one person has come forward to admit any sort of liability. Door dinks, bumps and a couple of scratches, all from car parks.

At Castro Martin we are quite fortunate that when Angela’s father built the Bodega over 30 years ago, he had the foresight to include a loading area for trucks, and also a generous area for parking. Until now this was simply an open area of concrete, and parking was simply a free-for-all – you parked your car where you could squeeze it in (and with Angela around, that was never going to be the best arrangement – for vehicle safety purposes). Suffice to say that she has a bit of a reputation for bumping into things, and suffers horribly from walls and posts that have a habit of reversing out in front of her!

Anyway, after painting an exterior wall the other day, we had a bit of white paint left over, and decided to paint some ‘official’ parking bays. We have made sure that each space is very generous so that even Angela has no excuse for causing any door dinks!!

Today will be a day of mixed emotions here in Spain, as they welcome a new King to the throne of Spain, whilst at the same time bidding farewell to their Kings of Football ‘La Roja’, unceremoniously dumped out of the World Cup by Chile. Perhaps it’s a bit disrespectful to mention the new King and a football team in the same sentence, but in the past few years football has become even more of a religion than it was before.

Yesterday in Madrid King Juan Carlos signed his final Act of Parliament, a law approving his abdication in favour of his son who will be crowned King Felipe VI in a low key ceremony today. During times of austerity in Spain it was deemed, quite correctly, to be inappropriate to have a lavish celebration. However, the centre of Madrid has still been decorated with tens of thousands of Spanish flags, and large crowds are expected to line the route between Congress and the Royal Palace to cheer the new King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia, who will then greet the nation from the Royal balcony.

In an even more low key ceremony, the Spanish football team will fly home after their final group game against Australia on Monday. The euphoria of 4 years ago, when they were crowned World Champions, long forgotten.

Today will be a day of mixed emotions here in Spain, as they welcome a new King to the throne of Spain, whilst at the same time bidding farewell to their Kings of Football ‘La Roja’, unceremoniously dumped out of the World Cup by Chile. Perhaps it’s a bit disrespectful to mention the new King and a football team in the same sentence, but in the past few years football has become even more of a religion than it was before.

Yesterday in Madrid King Juan Carlos signed his final Act of Parliament, a law approving his abdication in favour of his son who will be crowned King Felipe VI in a low key ceremony today. During times of austerity in Spain it was deemed, quite correctly, to be inappropriate to have a lavish celebration. However, the centre of Madrid has still been decorated with tens of thousands of Spanish flags, and large crowds are expected to line the route between Congress and the Royal Palace to cheer the new King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia, who will then greet the nation from the Royal balcony.

In an even more low key ceremony, the Spanish football team will fly home after their final group game against Australia on Monday. The euphoria of 4 years ago, when they were crowned World Champions, long forgotten.

With all the recent rainfall, and now a blast of hot sunshine, we have perfect conditions in our vineyards for disease. Local growers are rushing out to treat their vines before the humidity takes its toll. 

People say that the vineyards of Burgundy are fragmented, but when you examine the ‘stats’ here in Galicia, I think we can give them a good run for their money….. In our denomination there are just over 4,000 hectares (about 10,000 acres) in total. This is divided between more than 6,700 registered grape growers, meaning that the average would be about 0.6 hectares (1.5 acres), except that some people have much more than the average. For example, we have 11 hectares (27 acres), meaning that many of the smallest growers have much less than the average. And this is not the end of the story – there are some 23,400 individual vineyard sites, so you can perhaps begin to imagine how fragmented we are as a wine producing area!

Anyway, back to my original point. With such small vineyard holdings much of the work is carried out by the owners and their family, and not using any hi-tech equipment either – it’s very much a hands on regime in which everyone has to play their part. Take, for example, this young man, in today’s photo, sent out in the early morning to spray his family’s plot using just a small back pack. His protective equipment?…. A blue work coat and a motorcycle helmet. Better than nothing I guess (but only just).

With all the recent rainfall, and now a blast of hot sunshine, we have perfect conditions in our vineyards for disease. Local growers are rushing out to treat their vines before the humidity takes its toll. 

People say that the vineyards of Burgundy are fragmented, but when you examine the ‘stats’ here in Galicia, I think we can give them a good run for their money….. In our denomination there are just over 4,000 hectares (about 10,000 acres) in total. This is divided between more than 6,700 registered grape growers, meaning that the average would be about 0.6 hectares (1.5 acres), except that some people have much more than the average. For example, we have 11 hectares (27 acres), meaning that many of the smallest growers have much less than the average. And this is not the end of the story – there are some 23,400 individual vineyard sites, so you can perhaps begin to imagine how fragmented we are as a wine producing area!

Anyway, back to my original point. With such small vineyard holdings much of the work is carried out by the owners and their family, and not using any hi-tech equipment either – it’s very much a hands on regime in which everyone has to play their part. Take, for example, this young man, in today’s photo, sent out in the early morning to spray his family’s plot using just a small back pack. His protective equipment?…. A blue work coat and a motorcycle helmet. Better than nothing I guess (but only just).

Those of you who follow our site might already know my thoughts about wine competitions. I have very mixed views….. My opinion is that there are just so many variables involved that can ultimately affect the outcome.  The biggest problem can simply be how your wine performs in front of the judges. For example, it could be that you wine is recently bottled, recently sulphured, or perhaps it’s simply too young and not showing at its best. It’s position in the tasting line up can also influence how it is judged. If yours is a more subtle, elegant wine that finds itself in the middle of a selection of less subtle, more full-bodied, slightly sweeter, or perhaps even slightly more alcoholic wines, then it can quite easily be lost, or simply overpowered. The list of potential stumbling blocks goes on, so much so that in the end the result can become a bit of a lottery. Writing about a wine, offering the consumer a description and guiding them is one thing, but awarding medals based on a snapshot of how your wine shows at one precise moment in it’s life, well, that can sometimes be a bit misleading.

As a result of our frustrations with said competitions we simply chose to abstain completely from entering, but that’s not to say that our wines are never submitted. Of course it is the prerogative of our customers to decide whatever they chose to do in this respect, and of course we will always support their choice.

The other day I was surfing the internet, visiting a few wine websites (as I have been known to do on occasions), when I stumbled across a silver medal! It appears that our Bodega Castro Martin 2012 had won a silver medal at  the 2014 International Wine Challenge in London. We had no idea that it had won a prize, and didn’t even know that it had been entered – suffice to say that it came as quite a surprise…..

Those of you who follow our site might already know my thoughts about wine competitions. I have very mixed views….. My opinion is that there are just so many variables involved that can ultimately affect the outcome.  The biggest problem can simply be how your wine performs in front of the judges. For example, it could be that you wine is recently bottled, recently sulphured, or perhaps it’s simply too young and not showing at its best. It’s position in the tasting line up can also influence how it is judged. If yours is a more subtle, elegant wine that finds itself in the middle of a selection of less subtle, more full-bodied, slightly sweeter, or perhaps even slightly more alcoholic wines, then it can quite easily be lost, or simply overpowered. The list of potential stumbling blocks goes on, so much so that in the end the result can become a bit of a lottery. Writing about a wine, offering the consumer a description and guiding them is one thing, but awarding medals based on a snapshot of how your wine shows at one precise moment in it’s life, well, that can sometimes be a bit misleading.

As a result of our frustrations with said competitions we simply chose to abstain completely from entering, but that’s not to say that our wines are never submitted. Of course it is the prerogative of our customers to decide whatever they chose to do in this respect, and of course we will always support their choice.

The other day I was surfing the internet, visiting a few wine websites (as I have been known to do on occasions), when I stumbled across a silver medal! It appears that our Bodega Castro Martin 2012 had won a silver medal at  the 2014 International Wine Challenge in London. We had no idea that it had won a prize, and didn’t even know that it had been entered – suffice to say that it came as quite a surprise…..

The other day I was watching the commemoration of the D-Day landings on my news channel – celebrated on the Normandy beaches under blue skies and warm sunshine. As I looked out of my own window it was rather depressing to see the rain, falling from leaden grey skies, accompanied by a chilling wind. This is just not typical June weather. Indeed, without exaggerating, there have only been a handful of days so far this year when the daytime temperatures have exceeded 20°C (68°F). Not ideal for grape cultivation…..

In my desperation I consulted the weather forecast to see if there was any change on the horizon, and what I discovered was quite an eye opener. This week’s forecast shows a dramatic leap in temperatures, from today’s 17°C (63°F) to just over 30°C (86°F). Does this mean I can finally put my winter sweaters away?

The other day I was watching the commemoration of the D-Day landings on my news channel – celebrated on the Normandy beaches under blue skies and warm sunshine. As I looked out of my own window it was rather depressing to see the rain, falling from leaden grey skies, accompanied by a chilling wind. This is just not typical June weather. Indeed, without exaggerating, there have only been a handful of days so far this year when the daytime temperatures have exceeded 20°C (68°F). Not ideal for grape cultivation…..

In my desperation I consulted the weather forecast to see if there was any change on the horizon, and what I discovered was quite an eye opener. This week’s forecast shows a dramatic leap in temperatures, from today’s 17°C (63°F) to just over 30°C (86°F). Does this mean I can finally put my winter sweaters away?

Tomorrow we are closed for a wine festival, not as you might think for Albariño, but rather for our local red wine – Tinto de Barrantes. I have to confess that the actual legality of this wine is somewhat dubious, as I have never seen even one single labelled bottle in any shop or restaurant. Somehow the authorities seem to turn a blind eye to this fact, even allowing it to be celebrated with a street festival and declaring one day of local holiday.

The wine itself is not my favourite, although whenever we have visitors to the bodega and they have the opportunity to taste it, they seem to be quite enamoured. Personally I describe it as being something akin to a partially fermented Beaujolais, with a deep purple colour, very low alcohol, green tannins and a highly volatile acidity – not very nice….. but clearly the locals love it!

Tomorrow we are closed for a wine festival, not as you might think for Albariño, but rather for our local red wine – Tinto de Barrantes. I have to confess that the actual legality of this wine is somewhat dubious, as I have never seen even one single labelled bottle in any shop or restaurant. Somehow the authorities seem to turn a blind eye to this fact, even allowing it to be celebrated with a street festival and declaring one day of local holiday.

The wine itself is not my favourite, although whenever we have visitors to the bodega and they have the opportunity to taste it, they seem to be quite enamoured. Personally I describe it as being something akin to a partially fermented Beaujolais, with a deep purple colour, very low alcohol, green tannins and a highly volatile acidity – not very nice….. but clearly the locals love it!

This week signals our move to a summer timetable – working from 8am to 4pm, instead of the 9am to 5pm that we work in winter. Of course we are at the extreme western edge of Europe, which means that the sun rises just a little later, but on the plus side we do enjoy very long, light summer evenings (now all we need is a bit of sunshine!) However, the real reason for starting a little earlier is based around the summer heat. Clearly, we do not suffer the extreme temperatures that they do in other parts of the country, but it does at least mean that we are able to complete much of our working day in the vineyards before the mercury hits its late afternoon peak. (Note that during periods of excessive heat our vineyard guys do start at 7am).

I should also say that our bodega is fairly unique in that our working day is not split in two – as practised by many other industries around Spain. The tradition is normally to have a break of some two or three hours in the middle of the day, but for many different reasons (not least of all efficiency), we actively chose not to follow this practice.

This week signals our move to a summer timetable – working from 8am to 4pm, instead of the 9am to 5pm that we work in winter. Of course we are at the extreme western edge of Europe, which means that the sun rises just a little later, but on the plus side we do enjoy very long, light summer evenings (now all we need is a bit of sunshine!) However, the real reason for starting a little earlier is based around the summer heat. Clearly, we do not suffer the extreme temperatures that they do in other parts of the country, but it does at least mean that we are able to complete much of our working day in the vineyards before the mercury hits its late afternoon peak. (Note that during periods of excessive heat our vineyard guys do start at 7am).

I should also say that our bodega is fairly unique in that our working day is not split in two – as practised by many other industries around Spain. The tradition is normally to have a break of some two or three hours in the middle of the day, but for many different reasons (not least of all efficiency), we actively chose not to follow this practice.