The wine of Cantabria

At the end of the twentieth century, no one considered Cantabria to be a place of wine production. Not even its own inhabitants thought that there could be a Cantabrian wine. But a careful review of the uses and customs of their rural areas allowed us to see that, almost in each orchard, there was always a vineyard that accompanied the crops.

Despite the lack of evidence, we can assume that, after the end of the war between the legions of Julius Caesar against Cantabrians and Asturias, the cultivation of the vineyard was introduced in Cantabria through the different settlements of the Roman Empire. Later, during the Middle Ages, the proliferation of Christian monasteries with their important agricultural work would be a new push for this crop. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries much of the agricultural work would be abandoned in favor of livestock and growing industry.

However, the vines continued to grow in the orchards.

It will be at the end of the twentieth century when several producers begin to raise the cultivation of the vineyard in Cantabria. The coast and the region of Liébana will be the ones that start the recovery and produce the first wines. In 2012, the Government of Cantabria, through its Center for Agricultural Research and Training (CIFA, for its acronym in Spanish) initiates a recovery plan for local vine varieties. Also the cultivation of this plant, as well as wine tasting techniques, are incorporated into its training program. Some of the grape varieties have been incorporated into the Agroreserva of Campoo de Yuso, which we already talked about here.

The predominant type of wine in Cantabria has a common base to the “txakoli” produced by our neighbors in the Basque Country. Then each producer adds its nuances and its unique qualities as befits a good wine.

In many cases, wineries add wine tourism as a source of money while publicizing their product. The varieties range from the stay in medium-high range accommodation to the possibility of participating in some of the necessary tasks of harvesting and processing the grapes. This adopts a model that has already been successful in other regions of Spain, but adding the qualities of our land.

If we highlight this example, it is because it highlights a series of issues of great interest when proposing an agricultural project: history, popular traditions, science and the ability to update all these elements have made it possible to recover a tradition while opening a way of employment taking advantage of the experiences of other places that have already proven their value.

Foto by Laura Stanley