Rioja, Spain · Served with dinner · Around 90% Viura, 10% Malvasía

López de Heredia has been making wine in Haro since 1877. The story goes that they set up beside the railway station just as phylloxera was destroying France's vineyards, so barrels could go straight onto trains to Bordeaux merchants desperate for wine. Very little about how they work has changed since. Tondonia Blanco Reserva spends six years in old American oak barrels, racked by hand twice a year, before it's bottled unfiltered.

The result is golden, nutty and savoury, with notes of honey, dried citrus and beeswax, and a freshness that keeps it lively. It's a white that behaves a little like a fine sherry and a little like aged Burgundy, and it's wonderful with food.