2019 Bodegas y Vinedos Luna Beberide Finca Vino de Paraje Bierzo 750 ml

Mencía, the rising-star grape of the Bierzo region in northwest Spain, has Pinot’s elegance—the brightness and soft tannins—but with notes of cracked pepper and hints of green tobacco that makes it clear it is without a doubt its own thing.  

We reach for Mencía often, and of all of them, the 2019 Luna Beberide has become one of our go-tos—a wine that shows superlative quality for an absurdly low price. 

Wine Advocate is a fan as well: They doled out 92 points alongside a glowing review extolling winemaker Alejandro Luna. They’ve also praised past wines from Luna Beberide as “drop-dead gorgeous,” lauding the bottlings’ “unprecedented finesse and elegance” and declaring “love at first sight.” 

Wine Spectator included Mencía as one of “The Must-Try Wines of Our Time,” and Wine Enthusiast named Luna Beberide Mencías among the “Top Wines of Bierzo.” 

Over the last few years, Alejandro Luna has been tweaking the style of the Luna Beberide bit by bit, and it's really paying dividends. He cold soaks the grapes to extract fruit flavor and then ferments with native yeast to maximize complexity and express terroir as clearly as possible. After that, he gives a gentle polish to the tannins by using neutral French oak barrels for aging. The resulting wine is pure and distraction-free.

This is the quintessence of the Mencía grape without any extra makeup or fuss—the perfect bottle to pour when you’re looking for a red wine to sidle up next to some grilled salmon or to accompany souvlaki and spanakopita. The energy here demands a second sip—our reaction is generally “Where did the rest of the bottle go?”