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 Introduction   The Solera System   Types of Sherry

Both historically and in terms of prestige and exports, sherry is the single most important Spanish wine. It is also the oldest wine region in the country. It's history dates back to Roman times but it only started to became really popular by the 14th century. The name sherry comes from Xeres, the Arab name for the town where most of it is made, today's Jerez de la Frontera.

By Elizabethan times it was being drunk in England in large amounts under the name of 'sack' (probably from the Spanish sacar, to export). As the centuries went by, British merchants settled in strength, first to ship the wines and then, during the 18th and 19th centuries, to set up bodegas and make it themselves. Many firms, now mostly Spanish controlled, still bear their English names, such as Osborne, Terry or Williams and Humbert.

Three principal grape varieties are grown in some of the most fertile vineyards in the country. Palomino is used to make the finos while Pedro Ximénez and Moscatel are used more to produce the sweet wines

There have been periodic attempts to duplicate the sherry process in other parts of the world, but none has been fully successful. This is due partly to soil and climate, but the greatest difference is caused by the unique workings of the solera system which gives the wine its special flavour.

The real heart of the sherry process is the maturing and blending which takes place in the solera. This is controlled by a capataz, or foreman, who supervises the 'sherry cathedrals', immense cellars storing thousands of barrels of wine. (For example, the largest of Domecq's bodegas houses more than 25,000 barrels, each one with a capacity of 600 litres. Now that's a lot of sherry.)

A solera is composed usually of four rows of barrels stacked on top of one another. The young wine is fed into the top barrels and, through a process of gradual blending to ensure uniform results it is transferred down the rows until it can be drawn off the bottom for bottling. One rule is that barrels are never more than two-thirds full and no more than one third is ever drawn off at a time. This means that the new and old wines are blended in a steady process that gives life and vigour to the older wine while guaranteeing character and body to the younger.This practice of never draining the barrels means that there is theoretically still wine in the system that has been there since the founding of the solera, in some cases more than 100 years ago. It also explains why wine produced in this way has no attributable vintage date on the bottle.

The casks are deliberately left unsealed and one third empty so that nature can create its magic in the form of a very special yeast, or flor, which grows on top of the wine, basically creating a barrier against bacteria and helping give sherry its special flavour. This yeast culture only grows here and is principal reason why Jerez is the only true sherry in the world.