Ladeiras do Xil, Godello "Gaba do Xil ‘O Barreiro’ Branco" Valdeorras, Spain, 2023 (Telmo Rodriguez)

Overview of the Wine
The pioneering duo of Pablo Eguzkiza and Telmo Rodríguez started working in the Val do Bibei in 2002. Recognizing the potential to make world-class wines in this historic valley, they began a project that would take more than a decade to come to fruition: planting massale selection indigenous varieties from old vineyards that would eventually become O Barreiro. 

Ladeiras do Xil is named for the hillsides along the Sil River (literally “slopes of the Sil”), which, along with the Miño River, is the lifeblood of the Ourense province, including the Valdeorras and Ribeira Sacra wine regions. Ladeiras do Xil produces a highly-coveted collection of extremely low-production, single-vineyard grand cru red wines: Valbuxán, As Caborcas, Falcoeira, and O Diviso, along with two white wines: Branco de Santa Cruz and Falcoeira Branco. All are field blends of indigenous grape varietals reflecting the purity and transcendence of one of the most exceptional terroirs in Europe. Ladeiras do Xil is a life’s project to recover and vindicate the exceptional sites along the Sil and Bibei rivers, uncovering their grand cru potential.

Winemaker: Telmo Rodriguez

Vegan and Organic.

Grape / Blend
100% Godello

Origin
Valdeorras, Spain

Winemaker's Tasting Notes
Gaba do Xil is named for the hillsides of the Sil River, which is the lifeblood of the mountainous interior of Galicia with its continental influences and as the gateway to the Atlantic coast. Gaba do Xil are the estate-grown red and white village wines which serve as an introduction to the limited production single cru wines of Ladeiras do Xil, offering the drinker an incredible value for handmade Galician wines.

Gaba do Xil ‘O Barreiro’ is a white wine produced from a single 16ha estate vineyard located at 400-500m in altitude, near the town of Larouco, which lies south of the Sil River with an Atlantic influence due to its location in a valley that forms an outlet to the sea. It was fermented in Lugar de Valbuxán, an old, historic pazo and winery in O Bolo county they renovated and brought back to life. With the restoration of Valbuxán, the wines of Ladeiras do Xil are now being made in the terruño of their historic homeland.

O Barreiro expresses the Atlantic character of this part of Valdeorras through its native varieties (mostly godello, but with other indigenous white grapes like doña blanca and treixadura) farmed organically and grown on red slate and clay soils. The O Barreiro vineyard selection, with very low yields and reduced volume, is an incredibly expressive, mineral wine with a complex structure. O Barreiro is fresh and precise, with salty minerality and a long, dry finish. Gaba do Xil is produced with organic, ancestral farming, and low intervention in a polyculture setting.

91 Points - Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The super young and aromatic white 2023 Gaba do Xil O Barreiro comes from a warm year with an early harvest that delivered round and ripe wines like this one with 13.5% alcohol. It has notes of bay leaf and white flowers and is still a little reductive. It fermented in stainless steel with indigenous yeasts, where it matured for four months. The heat of the vintage is not obvious in the wine, even though it's a little riper and rounder, with the character from the red soils in the zone of Larouco. It ends with a pleasant, bitter twist in the finish.

Product size: 750ml