The Valle Seco Estate
- The Valle Seco Estate was founded in 2009 by Federico Lencioni & Francisco Sarabia who decided in that year to put to vine a small plot of land from their vast highland ranch. They had noted for years that this parcel was consistently covered in fog in the morning and breezy throughout the morning, two traits that made it ideally suited for growing grapes. Since then it has been a bit of a fairytale success story for these ranchers turned winemakers whose grapes have been sold since the beginning to wines that have consistently won top awards in every competition they entered. Selling grapes was never their plan A, and in 2018, when the vineyards had reached a level of maturity that they felt confident in, they started making their own wine. They teamed up with the well-known winemaker/enologist Sergio Heras, (originally from Argentina) who has been making wine Northern Baja for a decade and is one of its most well-respected winemakers, and stage two of the dream began. Today they make 4 wines: A natural Cabernet Sauvignon, a traditional red blend, a rosé of Mourvedre and another blend called K3 that is not exported. While the rosé and red blend are not made with native yeast, the yeast used is certified organic and throughout the rest of the process of making the wine they maintain a very low intervention approach. Here are some of the details about their estate and vineyards:
- Their southeastern facing vineyard site is located 18 miles from the Pacific in Valle Seco at an elevation of 1,800 ft. Soil is composed of decomposed granite, sand, and some clay.
- Their vineyards are completely isolated from any other wineries and farmed organically and sustainably.
- The vast highland plain where the winery is located has better water reserves that most of the viticultural regions of Northern Baja, and it is accessed by a pump powered by the wind. That’s right, the windmill that appears on their logo is an image of the windmill that was erected nearly 100 years ago and still serves to pump up the water from the underground aquifer for use in the winery.
Total production: 29 acres under vine, 4 wines, 1,200 cases
2023 Valle Seco Rosé - Valle Seco
Tasting Notes and Drinking Window:
It would be impossible to overstate how much of an improvement this vintage is over the pervious three. Quite possibly the Mexican rosé of the vintage, this is layered, elegant, crisp and nuanced in a way that puts it on par with the best of the best from around the world.
Major changes in the vineyard account for most of the improvements according to their winemaking team, who have put their blood, sweat and tears into this project and were essentially impossible to reach in 2023 because of how much work they were putting in at the vineyard. The reward... is in the bottle.
3000 cases made
Drinking window: upon release - 4 years
Vintage:
2023
Blend:
100% Mourvedre
Producer:
Valle Seco
Winemaker:
Sergio Heras - Mexican (lives in Valle de Guadalupe)
Vineyards:
Valle Seco – From the only vineyard in a high elevation valley which lies up above Valle de Guadalupe where the Guadalupe river originates. Elevation is 1,800 ft, and the soil is largely granite with some clay. Vines planted in 2010 and 2016. All estate owned.
Winemaking:
Harvested by hand from the estate vineyards in the night to preserve maximum freshness. Clusters are destemmed and grapes sorted by hand before crushing. With the intention of making a very light beautiful Provencal style rosé, the juice was pulled away from the skins almost immediately to allow only a small amount of pigment in the wine. Fermented in open top stainless steel tanks for 3 weeks at the lowest temperature possible to give the wine the maximum time to develop complexity of aroma and flavor. Once fermentation was complete, the wine was racked off the lees and left to rest in a stainless tank for 2 months before bottling.
Sulfites: 55 ppm
Farming:
Organic, sustainable
Alcohol:
12.5%
