Utiel-Requena

The estates and their villages

Two of our estates sit in Casas de Eufemia, a village that belongs to Requena. At Viña de Eufemia, winemaker Héctor Benavente lets herbs and shrubs grow between the vines. At Carres, José Luis Torres Carpio farms around 2.5 hectares by the lunar calendar and names every wine after its plot.

Verónica Romero has her vines around Los Duques and Venta del Moro. She is the first in her family to stop selling the grapes to the cooperative. In Requena itself, Vicente García and Ana Suria founded Pago de Tharsys in 2002, and near Utiel Félix Martínez runs Vera de Estenas, a bodega founded in 1945, as the third generation.

What grows alongside Bobal

Bobal is the red grape of the region, and our Bobal story tells its history. Less well known is that Requena is one of the few areas outside Catalonia where Cava may be made. Vicente García of Pago de Tharsys is called the «father of Cava in Requena».

The white grape we follow most closely in Utiel-Requena is Tardana. It had almost vanished, and today Carres and Verónica Romero make wine from old bush vines of it. For a first bottle from the area we would pick a Tardana white, even though the region is known for its reds.

From Casas de Eufemia and Venta del Moro

• Carres Sabinilla 2024: Tardana from bush vines over 60 years old in the Sabinilla plot, wild-fermented and aged for three months in barrique on the fine lees.
• Verónica Romero Los Renteros 2024: Bobal from bush vines of around 77 years in Las Monjas near Venta del Moro, aged five months in 600-litre clay amphorae under a layer of flor, about 900 bottles.
• Noria Tinto de Eufemia 2025: 80 percent Bobal from old vines and 20 percent Merlot from Casas de Eufemia, six months in wooden casks.

Altitude, wind and little rain

Our estates farm between 700 and 900 metres, on lime-rich soils with clay, sand and loam. Summers are hot and dry, nights cool. At Vera de Estenas, at the foot of the Sierra del Remedio, the Solano wind takes the edge off the summer heat. Pago de Tharsys picks the Albariño for its Vendimia Nocturna at night at 700 metres; in 2024 it was the night of 8 to 9 September. At Carres in Casas de Eufemia less than 200 millimetres of rain fall a year, and the old bush vines there are not irrigated.