Sipping blindly you’d think you tasted something like this before. Then you recall — it was on Etna and it felt like a weird wine in the middle of volcanic mass of stones scorched by the sun. Those were not the wines you’re used to. Whoever knows how to spell Frank Cornelissen’s name will also happily smile ingesting the wines from Diego Lozada of La Senda.
I won’t be telling fairytales about Bierzo’s identity: La Senda wines really have their own way. Unlike most wineries of Bierzo there is no Godello-Mencia dichotomy there. No one convinces anyone of anything: just try and draw your own conclusions.
This setup is familiar: find a bunch of old vines on a cool plot, harvest them ripe, ferment wildly, crush with a basket press (or even with feet), macerate, avoid sulfites as much as possible and don’t bother with filtration. Check, check, check: this is the artist’s cuisine, a small family restaurant that you stopped by without googling or looking it up in Michelin Guide.
Diego Losada is another Spanish new-wave youngster like Manuel Murana, Rodri Mendez, Jonathan Garcia Lima and other amigos of forever-young long-bearded Raul Perez. The words PURE WINE are burned into Diego’s fingers on both hands; perhaps toes would also carry useful information about the winemaking style. He started in the 2010s, and in 2022 he makes wines that stand out and powerfully invite you to come to the place where they are born.
I’ve seen wineries located right on the famous Camino de Santiago — some of them simply do not get what kind of wine to make and how. They call a consultant and hope that everything will work out, that there will be an influx of dough and no risk. La Senda means “the way”, but Diego specifically mentions that this way is more mental than physical. Many can go walk the path, only a few can take something out of it “for the soul”.
Born in Bierzo, Diego went to study in Madrid, discovered the basics of conventional winemaking, chemistry, biology, etc. Having returned to his native land he makes wine from 15 parcels on five hectares. The vines are for the most part old and bush-trained, the very ones that leave wine aficionads breathless.
Raw cement and chestnut foudres are a conscious choice, steel does not make Diego want to pour “live” wine into it. Losada does not spare his fellow natural winemakers: “Many mindlessly copy the formulas,” he says.
La Senda / In a Gadda da Vida / 2019
The aromas and flavors overwhelm the unprepared, but let it breathe and “the Cornelissen” almost disappears leaving us with a pleasant, resonant, soft orange wine with a hint of nuts and stone fruit. By the way, it’s the only white wine of La Senda, a blend of Godello, Doña Blanca, Palomino and Malvasia varieties from 60-90-year-old vines. Old open fermentation barrels, 10 days skin contact and eight months in neutral oak. Bottled naturally, with low SO2 levels.
La Senda / In Absentia / 2020
When Jura and Bierzo got married, In Absentia was born. Don’t expect to enjoy this one right away, it needs to breathe and then no one will drag you away from the glass: friendly, imposing, outrageous. The wine is made unexpectedly from the Trousseau grapes and also from old, airy-clumsy vines (miracle, 80-95 years old). 3-4 days of maceration on the skins bring nutty notes; those open chestnut vats clearly played their role. Finished fermentation in the French oak and slept in them for another 11 months. Natural bottling without sulfur and filtration.
La Senda / 1984 / 2020
That one sits on the “dark” side (as 1984’s naming suggests the Orwellian angle to it), with tongue-twisting acidity (now called “freshness”) and cherry-plum overtones. Finally, Mencia, because there is no life without Mencia in Bierzo, and the old clay patches of land found by Diego are good, the vines reach 90 years of age. Anyone who has seen old Mencia vines knows how cool they look, at an altitude of 650 meters. This wine is the result of blending berries from three different vineyards. They are partially fermented without destemming in large wooden barrels, and then chill for 8 months in barriques. Natural bottling, of course.
As to be expected from Losada.