These vines were planted before the American Civil War. Finca Genoveva is a single parcel of roughly 180-year-old Albarino rooted in pure granite — soil so poor that phylloxera never managed to get a foothold. Rodrigo Mendez ferments and ages the wine for a full year in large, well-seasoned neutral foudres with the lees left untouched, which builds texture without ever burying the fruit in oak. It is famously closed and austere when young, so give it a big glass, plenty of air, and ideally a few years. Modest in alcohol, chiseled, and full of energy rather than weight — this is Albarino operating at the level of serious white Burgundy or Chablis.