Summer White Wines

Organic

The New York Times 20 Under $20: 20 WINES TO DRINK RIGHT NOW
Bodegas Zudugarai produces a range of different Txakolinas from Getaria in the Basque region of Spain. Antxiola is lovely gently sparkling, light bodied and low in alcohol. It tastes as if you’re savoring the freshest sea breeze. - Eric Asimov

Lemon-drop, candied-pear and pineapple character, following through to a medium body with a creamy texture and a fruity, tangy finish. Drink now.

Antxiola pronounced (ahn-cho-la) is a txacoli wine made by Bodegas Zudugarai. The winery was founded in 1989 by the Errasti family, the same year that the DO of Getaria-Txakolina was founded. The vineyards are farmed organically, and their Hondurabbi grapes are hand-picked and fermented with native yeasts in stainless steel tanks. The wine is then bottled young to retain some of its natural effervescence. The result is a bracingly refreshing wine with a slight spritz, bursting with citrus and minerality. Fresh slices of Granny Smith apple and lemon-lime titillate the palate, with bright acidity giving a mouthwatering finish.

Natural / Sustainable

93 points Wine Advocate
The 2024 Albamar is the entry-level white here, produced with grapes from different plots. It's still very young, but it has no reduction. It is a bit shy but shows clean and precise, serious and austere beyond the varietal notes, with good ripeness and very good balance and a dry, chalky finish. It has 13% alcohol and integrated acidity. I think 2024's main characteristic is balance.

Organic

93+ points Wine Advocate
They picked the grapes for the varietal white 2024 Garnacha Blanca quite early to produce the fresh profile they like, with 12.6% alcohol, a pH of 3.18 and 6.45 grams of acidity, thus avoiding the heavy and alcoholic wines Garnacha Blanca can produce when picked too late. They used grapes from the village of Fitero to ferment it in stainless with indigenous yeasts, and it matured mostly in concrete but also in a 2,000-liter Stockinger foudre, a 1,500-liter used foudre, five new 500-liter French oak barrels and two 700-liter concrete eggs. It’s super pale and more reductive, flinty, still very young and serious. It has a clean, elegant and precise nose, with good freshness and less volume, sharper and precise, more vertical, with great finesse. It makes you salivate. They are moving toward more time in bottle and less in wood/concrete for their wines in general. They really like 2024 for whites. This wine really transcends the price. 23,200 bottles were produced. It was bottled in July 2025.

They used grapes from the village of Fitero to ferment the must in stainless with indigenous yeasts. The wine matured mostly in concrete, a 2,000-liter Stockinger foudre and five new 500-liter French oak barrels. It's fresh, floral and elegant, with purity and balance, a spicy touch from the wood. It has a very tasty finish and even a salty twist, super fresh with lots of finesse. It has volume and freshness, the vibrancy from an early harvest and the contained ripeness and alcohol. This is the style they wanted for this wine and took the time to find it; it's more Burgundian than Mediterranean, to me. It should age nicely in bottle. And a bargain.

Organic

Well-rounded and harmonious with concentrated fruit flavors of peaches yellow plums, apricots and floral notes while mineral on the palate with long mouth-watering finish. 50% Encruzado, 15% Malvasia Fina, 15% Bical, 15% Cerceal Branco, 5% others (co-ferment). After harvest, some grapes undergo 24 hours of skin contact, with the remainder pressed whole-cluster into cement and steel tanks. Following spontaneous fermentation, the wine ages on its lees for six months.

Natalia Jessa is the mastermind behind Gota which has a simple yet bold objective: craft aromatically-driven, authentic fine wines of Portugal, while remaining value-conscious. Her many prior travels throughout Portuguese wine country on behalf of one of Europe?????s major food markets enabled Natalia to develop invaluable relationships and gain access to some of the most exciting and as-of-yet undiscovered wineries and vineyards. She collaborates with them, as negociant, to select grapes that capture the optimal expression of a vintage. Vineyards are dry-farmed. Vines are ungrafted. To preserve fruit aromatics, winemaking utilizes ambient yeast and minimizes oak use. Adhering to tradition, wines are varietal blends and grapes are only native (no international varietals). Gota means "drop", referring to the humble origins of this project.

94+ points Wine Advocate
The white 2021 Flor de Muga Blanco Reserva sold with the Reserva category, as the market is more and more interested in whites with a long élevage. It's a white with aging potential and complexity produced with a blend of 40% old-vine Viura, 30% Garnacha Blanca and 30% Maturana Blanca with good ripeness in a great year when the grapes ripened thoroughly and developed full aromas and flavors but kept very good freshness. The free-run juice fermented in small barrels at low temperature, then was kept in concrete eggs for three months and then aged for six months in new barrels crafted by their coopers. It's smoky, spicy and toasty, still very young and undeveloped, primary but open and expressive with balsamic notes of bay leaf, waxy apples and flowers, and it has a seamless and balanced palate with a serious, chalky finish. 23,038 bottles produced. It was bottled in November 2022

Bodegas Muga’s new premier Rioja Blanco comprised of 40% Viura, 30% Garnacha Blanca, and 30% Maturana from vineyards planted between 1940-1980. A classic Rioja white wine vinified with three of the region's most important indigenous white varieties. Viura provides weight, structure, and aging potential. Garnacha Blanca imparts texture, alcohol, and acidity. Maturana adds aroma. The bodegas wanted a wine to compete with the best white Burgundies, which they have successfully done. Bravo!

After brief maceration in the press, the free-run must is selected, the first must which comes out of the press by gravity. This is then fermented at a low temperature in small oak vats. Once fermentation is complete, the wine is left on its fine lees for 3 months in an Oeuf de Beaune (concrete wine egg) to preserve the aromas and give body on the palate. Aging for 6 months in new French oak casks (Nevers and the Normandy town of Les Loges) with a light toast. After that it will undergo a process of refinement and rounding in the bottle for a further 18 months.

Organic / Biodynamic

10 hours on the skins followed by spontaneous fermentation in stainless steel tanks. Aged in stainless. Filtered. A bright yellow color with a brilliant focus and structure. Mineral driven, stony, savory, and a delicate salinity aspect that is intriguing. A compelling wine that any white wine drinker will enjoy.

12% abv