CVNE - Cune
Founded 1879 by the Real de Asua brothers (Raimondo and Eusebio) of Bilbao, C.V.N.E (hereafter, Cune, pronounced coo-nay) has been an integral part of the Rioja region’s ascendance in the fine wine world. Early success came as a négociant house supplying bulk wine to a France devastated by Phylloxera and odium. Committing to a fine wine vision of Rioja, the brothers soon moved away from bulk wine shipping and began purchasing and planting vineyards around Rioja Alta and employed cellar masters from Bordeaux. The company is still run by the fifth generation descendant of the Real de Asua brothers. Innov7ation combined with tradition has seen Cune become a consistently reliable source for high quality Rioja wine. Cune, in our mind is the most delicious and relevant of these big houses making ‘traditional Rioja’. The family produces wine from 600 acres of vineyards mostly from Villalba and has longstanding contracts with growers from Haro, Brinas, Briones and Zarraton, with the oldest vines coming from Torremontalbo. The red wines are balanced by some Mazuelo, Graciano and sometimes Viura to give a wine of good acidity at around 13% alcohol, typically with a slightly austere tannin profile. Additionally, Cune produces a sub-label called Imperial which releases Reserva and Grand Reserva bottlings in exceptional years. Just like the basic Cune wines, the fruit for Imperial is sourced 60% from Cune’s own vineyards and the rest from long term contract growers.
20th Century Rioja is best known through the lense of what has come to be called ‘traditional’ Rioja. More or less typical handling regimes are along these lines: fruit is largely purchased from growers (typically paid on a qualitative criteria), and tends to be light-bodied and somewhat early picked. The fermented wine is aged in older American oak, often for extended periods, and usually with a considerable number of rackings. The effect of this is to affect a claret-like palate shape, dropping much of the fleshy tannin of Tempranillo out of the equation and hammering the jubey round richness of the grape into a spare, dry, elegant and wood-struck register. Unlike some others in Barrio de Estacion, Cune’s bodegas are wonderfully clean and fresh-smelling. Unsurprisingly, this follows through into clean, fresh, uncluttered aromatic profiles in their wines.
Vinedos del Contino
Contino is a single-estate bodega of 62 hectares under vine, based in a 200 year old farmhouse in Laserna, just outside Laguardia in the Alavesa sub-region. Created in 1974 by C.V.N.E and Jose Madrazo Real de Asua (father of Contino’s current winemaker, Jesus Madrazo), the family owner of the estate. Jesus, an engineer as well as oenologist, took over in 1994 and is constantly revising the growing and making of the 7 distinct plots on the estate, each of which is vinified as a separate wine prior to selection and blending the house range. Contino was set up to be a counter to the Rioja trend of buying/blending to build brands (including of course, by Cune themselves!), with crisp acidy fruit from the cold soils in the North blended with more colourful ripe and alcoholic fruit from Southern Rioja. Prior to the establishment of Contino, the vineyards regularly provided the fruit for the legendary Gran Reservas of Viña Real. SCOTT WASLEY, The Spanish Acquisition
