Terroir al Limit Pedra de Guix 2022

“The white 2022 Pedra de Guix is a coupage of old-vine 40% Garnacha Blanca and 30% each Pedro Ximénez and Macabeo that fermented with full clusters for three days and matured in concrete for eight months. It has 13% alcohol with a pH of 3.58 and 4.6 grams of acidity. It has a very reductive personality and was not easy to read. It took a long time in the glass to dissipate the reduction and unfurl aromas of yellow fruit, stone fruit, wet chalk and a stony sensation. It has a chalky texture, clean and tasty flavors, with some austerity. This is the second year when the wines are not in oak foudre anymore, and it’s all in concrete. 4,508 bottles produced. It was bottled in May 2023. Drink: 2023-2029. 95 points

Since 2021, Dominik Huber has worked exclusively with concrete and a little stainless steel, and he sold all the oak he had in the cellar. He would like to build a new winery and is buying and planting new vineyards for the white wines and planting Garnatxa Peluda in Montsant. He has started working on the analysis of the soils with Chilean expert Pedro Parra. And he and his winemaker and partner Tatjana Peceric had a baby girl, Filipa, in September 2022. Congratulations! The organic certification of the winery will be completed with the 2024 harvest.

They currently work around 21 hectares, mostly owned and some rented with long-term contracts, allowing them to produce around 100,000 bottles per year. I tasted the 2022s, which was a warmer and drier year (350 liters of rain compared with the 490 liters in 2021), and that is reflected in wines with more body and structure, with lower yields but a healthy crop, and the maceration and extraction was adjusted accordingly. The top wines from 2022 felt very austere and ungiving. I wish I had a time machine to see them in five years or so.”

Luis Gutierrez, Wine Advocate (05/24)