# Terme de Laureano Blanc Macabeo (2023)

- **Producer:** Mendall
- **Colour:** white
- **Type:** still
- **Grapes:** Macabeo
- **Region:** Catalonia, Spain
- **Style:** Natural
- **Alcohol:** 12.5%
- **Average price:** €28
- **Vegan:** Yes
- **Contains sulphites:** Yes
- **When to drink:** Now or Later
- **Serving temperature:** 8–10 °C
- **Aromas & flavours:** lemon, orange, apple, pear, herbaceous

## About this wine

Mendall was founded by Laureano Serres Montagut in his hometown of Pinell de Brai, Catalunya, after he left a career as a computer programmer in Madrid. After returning to Terra Alta in 1996, Serres initially led the local winemaking cooperative before establishing his own project, Mendall, in 1999. In the early 2000s, he became a pioneer of the zero-zero natural winemaking movement in Spain. Today, Laureano crafts micro-cuvées alongside his daughter Alícia Serres. The Terme de Laureano Blanc comes from the Terme de Guiu plot in Vilalba dels Arcs, featuring 50-year-old Macabeo vines grown at an altitude of 500 meters on calcareous clay-loam topsoil over limestone bedrock.

## Interesting facts

- Founder Laureano Serres left a career as a computer programmer in Madrid to become a pioneer of zero-zero winemaking in Spain.
- Laureano Serres is a co-founder of the globally recognized Brutal! natural wine movement.
- This micro-cuvée produces fewer than 1,200 bottles annually from 50-year-old vines planted 500 meters above sea level.

## Food pairing

The high acidity, vibrant salinity, and linear focus of this direct-pressed Macabeo crave fresh, high-protein seafood and saline tapas. Citrus accents in food echo the vibrant profile of the wine, while light cheeses balance the crisp mineral structure without smothering its subtle nuances.

## Wine making process

The grapes are organically and biodynamically farmed and harvested by hand in small crates. Upon arrival at the cellar, the Macabeo grapes undergo immediate direct pressing without skin contact into neutral vats. Fermentation takes place spontaneously utilizing only indigenous yeasts. The wine rests on its fine lees in neutral vats for approximately one year prior to bottling. The cuvée is bottled unfined, unfiltered, and with zero added sulfur dioxide, leaving only naturally occurring sulfites.