As Jerez history goes, Valdespino was in at the beginning. The current company dates back to 1875, but there are written records of winegrowing in 1264. The present owners, the Estévez Group, acquired it in 1999, working with technical director Eduardo Ojeda. Ojeda is a key figure in the new Sherry world, as one of the partners in Equipo Navazos, a small négociant business that has been influential in showing how shippers can identify special butts for bottling. Deliciosa has been a Valdespino brand for almost a century, but its quality has been boosted by the soleras of Sanlúcar bodega La Guita, which Estévez purchased in 2007.
Pedro Ballesteros Torres MW: Very well-defined aromas: delicate and clean. Nice manzanilla style that is suave and open, with a lingering finish.
Sarah Jane Evans MW: Typical apple and camomile aromas – charmingly floral and delicate.
A manzanilla for the Spring Fair: a classically fresh drink with just a hint of saline bite. Delicate and finely balanced; the essence of a young manzanilla.
Nick Room: Straight, pleasant, slightly high-toned, fruity nose supports the pale lemon, green-tinged colour. Some toasty notes on the palate and a good incisive fruit delivery. Powerful, overt statement for Sherry. Tight but long.
Judges: Pedro Ballesteros Torres MW, Sarah Jane Evans MW, Nick Room
93 POINTS
Robert Parker Wine Advocate
The spring 2024 bottling of the NV Manzanilla Deliciosa en Rama (marked "Saca de Primavera 2024" on the front label of my bottle) is a pale, fresh and young Manzanilla selected from their bodega in the Calle Misericordia in the Barrio Alto of Sanlúcar de Barrameda. They were looking for the essence of Pago Miraflores when they consider it at its best, during the spring, when the flor is more active. The wine has the lightness and sharpness of the coastal vineyard, showcasing saline, mineral and iodine notes, a pungent palate and persistent flavors. It has some lactic, cheesy notes, hints of esparto grass and wet chalk. This is a good compromise between youth and development at five to six years of average age. They produced 14,688 half bottles with a cork stopper. It was bottled in May 2024. This is the only yearly bottling. With time in bottle, the profile will change.
93 POINTS
Robert Parker Wine Advocate
The NV Manzanilla Deliciosa en Rama, from the saca de primavera 2017, is the yearly bottling of the Manzanilla from the winery in the Calle Misericordia in Sanlúcar de Barrameda, very lightly filtered, unfined and with an average age of six years under flor. This is always a notch above the intensity, complexity and depth of a normal Manzanilla given the older age and the treatment of en rama. It's elegant, powerful, balanced and intense, with the telltale nose and palate of low tide character that provides that marine profile. Superb with food. 7,000 375-milliliter bottles were filled in April 2017.
93 POINTS
Robert Parker Wine Advocate
It's very interesting to taste a soon-to-be-bottled Manzanilla alongside the same wine that's been in bottle for one year, as I sampled the NV Manzanilla Deliciosa en Rama that was going to be bottled in the spring of 2019 next to the wine that had been bottled the year before. This felt tremendously young, with even a touch of lemon skin, which I sometimes find in very young biological wines. I tasted this just before bottling, and it was just like drinking wine from the bota. The wine will settle in bottle, and the explosive character I saw will not make it to the shelves. This wine is always from the same botas, so the differences are more a matter of how long the wine has been in bottle. In any case, I loved what I tasted. 8,600 bottles.
93 POINTS
Robert Parker Wine Advocate
I tasted two bottlings of their unfiltered Manzanilla, starting with the spring 2018 bottling of the NV Manzanilla Deliciosa en Rama. They now do a bottling per year, always in the spring, as that's the season when the flor yeasts are more active and give more expressive wines. It has had time to develop the mineral character and even seems to have put on weight, and it's more serious than the wine I tasted next to it that was about to be bottled. It has textbook Manzanilla character, the iodine, saltiness, esparto grass and long, sharp and pungent finish. It was bottled in April 2018. 9,700 375-milliliter bottles produced.
93 POINTS
Luis Gutierrez - Robert Parker Wine Advocate
The spring 2025 bottling of the NV Manzanilla Deliciosa en Rama is a light, fresh and young Manzanilla selected when the flor has more activity. It's a textbook representation of its category, with notes of brine and green almonds, with the lightness and sharpness of the coastal wines, with pungent flavors and a long finish. It's truly delicious. 3,072 half-bottles produced. It was bottled in March 2025. It's marked "Saca de Primavera 2025" on the front label.
Robert Parker Wine Advocate
The impressive line-up is opened with the pale-colored NV Manzanilla Deliciosa, which is produced with Palomino grapes from the Miraflores vineyard and aged for five years under yeast. It is a finer version of La Guita, easy to drink, with a sweet note of apples in the nose, a polished and gentle palate, ending with a saline touch. Drink 2013-2014.
I’ve often called Valdespino “the Romanee-Conti of Jerez.” Well, there, I’ve said it. To me they represent quality and tradition at the very top of the Sherry hierarchy. The winery, soleras and brands are old, registered in 1875, but with documentation about their commercial and winegrowing activities going back to the 13th century. Their recent history starts in 1999, when Jose Estevez purchases the company from the Valdespino family. Today Valdespino is the jewel in the crown of the Grupo Estevez, which also includes Real Tesoro and La Guita, who stock and age 35,000 botas of Sherry and own 800 hectares of vineyards, 56 of which come from the Pago Macharnudo, on pure white albariza soil, one of the best vineyards in the Marco de Jerez, and 17 hectares from the heart of Macharnudo are still fermented in bota today and form the core of brands like Inocente, Tio Diego, CP or Cardenal. All the wines were carefully and slowly moved to the new facilities of the Grupo Estevez on the outskirts of Jerez, where they continue their development under the supervision of Eduardo Ojeda, technical director, winemaker, who as a wine-lover is very aware of his role preserving these old soleras, wines and traditions.
Decanter
Creamy, yeasty appeal on the nose. Palate is bold and intense, showing notes of lime juice and ripe apples. Pungent with a tight grip. A wine of delicacy rather than power.
Judges: Pedro Ballesteros Torres MW, Sarah Jane Evans MW, Nick Room
