Muchada-Leclapart Etoile 2022

Muchada-Leclapart Etoile 2022

Muchada-Leclapart
$55.00

Grape: Palomino
Vintage: 2022
Type: White

This unfortified white wine is a pure expression of old-vine palomino grown under strict biodynamic guidelines in Sanlúcar de Barrameda. A collaborative project between Alejandro Muchada and David Léclapart, the winemaking purposefully avoids traditional sherry fortification, flor development, or heavy cask aging. The hand-picked grapes undergo a spontaneous fermentation driven by native wild yeasts in neutral vessels. The liquid matures on its fine fermentation lees to encourage natural structural definition and site transparency.

It pours a pale straw color, releasing delicate aromatics of fresh citrus rind, green apple, and white flowers over an iodine background. A sleek, medium-bodied frame pairs crisp orchard fruit flavors with an underlying chiseled mineral core. A lively wave of natural acidity cuts through the slightly waxy mouthfeel, maintaining excellent structural tension. The lees contact coordinates smoothly with a strong vein of maritime salinity that reflects the Atlantic coast. It finishes long, bone-dry, and elegant.

Muchada-Leclapart is the meeting of Marco Antonio Muchada's Andalusian roots and David Leclapart's Champagne sensibility. Based in Sanlucar de Barrameda, the project works old Palomino vines on albariza soils, farming biodynamically and seeking still white wines that express the chalk, Atlantic wind and light of Jerez country without fortification. The cellar work is deliberately simple: native fermentations, no heavy oak, long lees contact and very low additions. These wines helped redefine what Palomino could be outside the Sherry category, showing salinity, texture and luminous restraint rather than oxidative power.