Wine Spectator and Spanish Wines

http://www.winespectator.com/Wine/Free/Newsletter_Tip_Main/0,3963,306,00.html
This is an interesting article from WS.

... because I am quite curious about the section ";where to eat and where to stay in Valencia, Spain";... as Valencia is my town ;-)

I am also interested in that entry!

MaJesus

They stand, silver and gleaming, like giant spacecrafts parked at the city’s edge. Since it opened in 1999, the row of auditoriums and museums of Santiago Calatrava’s City of Arts and Sciences has come to define his hometown of Valencia as surely as Frank Gehry’s Guggenheim symbolizes Bilbao, Spain.

Once again, a Spanish city has revitalized itself through architecture. The half-dozen futuristic looking structures—a conference center designed by England’s Norman Foster; the aquarium, planetarium, performing arts center and humanities museum that make up Calatrava’s masterwork; and several of his signature bridges—have challenged the city’s assumptions about how things are supposed to look, function, taste.

";When you see them,"; says Raquel Torrijos, who owns and runs Restaurante Oscar Torrijos, perhaps Valencia’s most exciting restaurant, with her husband, chef Josep Quintana, ";you can’t help but feel more open, more eager to try new things. You want to invest in your business to make it more attractive, more in accordance with what the city has become.";

This time, the change could hardly have happened to a less likely place. Valencia is 220 miles down the Mediterranean coast from Barcelona but inhabits a different world. In part because of an economy based less on trade than on agriculture, this coastal city of 800,000—Spain’s third most populous—has historically turned away from the sea and toward the rural swampland of the Albufera to the south and the Levante plain to the west. Far from the cultural and gastronomic experimentation of the New Spain, the city—full of ornate 10-story buildings, with rounded corners and streets that intersect in shaded, octagon-shaped plazas—celebrates its own traditions, speaks its own language and revels in its own sports and festivals.

Yet since the summer of 1998, when the first of the components of the City of Arts and Sciences opened in a 2-kilometer stretch of dried riverbed, it has in many ways become a noticeably different place. ";I left [and lived in England] for five years,"; says native Ester Fernandez, the front-desk manager at Palau de la Mar, which opened in 2004 as the best hotel the city had ever seen. ";When I came back, I thought, ’Where is my city?’ Yet I much prefer it now.";

The city is even beginning to look toward the water. The sailboats of the America’s Cup finals will begin to fill the old harbor in April 2007, and new construction and other signs of life have begun to rouse the sleepy waterfront. Restaurants and hotels are starting to move into quiet barrios between the harbor and the center of town. Visitors who want to dip their feet in the Mediterranean need only travel a short distance south. Ideal beaches come into view just below the Albufera, and the Costa Blanca, with its white sand and simple seafood fare, begins just an hour’s drive down the coast.

The older generation of Valencia is still likely to gather on a Thursday afternoon to watch (and wager on) a game of trinquet, which is tennis combined with jai alai, played in a long indoor hallway. Las Fallas, the city’s bizarre fire festival, still results in the immolation of hundreds of giant wood-and-plaster statues (some costing as much as $100,000) every March. Dinners still start as late as midnight (the city’s symbol—on everything from the local soccer team’s jerseys to the manhole covers—is a bat), and paellas are more likely to feature the rabbit and snails of the Albufera than the seafood that outsiders might expect.

But traditional paella has been disappearing from Valencia’s menus. ";We might still go on a Sunday afternoon to somebody’s house for paella,"; says Fernandez, ";but now we’re more open to Mediterranean cuisine, which we had never really embraced, and to our own type of nouvelle cuisine.";

Everything has happened so fast. German chef Bernd Knoller came to Valencia<

La Sal, which served somewhat modernized versions of traditional food, morphed into the wildly inventive La Sucursal, situated inside the Institut Valencià d’Art Modern. The wonderful Torrijos, opened in 2001, is a spin-off of Restaurante Oscar Torrijos. At Ca Sento, the Aleixandre family still holds forth as it has for decades, but since the end of 2005, Sento Aleixandre’s son, Raul, has enlivened the cuisine with foams, infusions and gelatins while still driving it with the freshest seafood and local ingredients.

With the new food has come an awareness of wine, helped by a dynamic movement in the appellations surrounding Valencia: Utiel-Requena, Yecla and Jumilla. These days, the thriving international market for Spanish wines has led to a tremendous lift in quality in sleepy appellations like these. Now, it is the rare Valencian restaurant that hasn’t augmented its collection of Riojas and Priorats with at least a few examples from nearby bodegas.

";All of a sudden, people are very interested in Valencian wines,"; says sommelier Cristina Gomez of Senzone, in the Palau de la Mar. Gomez lards her wine list with as many small-batch cuvées from nearby appellations as she can. During a recent visit, nine of 72 choices were local, including the delicious Maduresa Cellar del Roure Valencia 2003 from the town of Moixent—impossible to find and a steal at $35. The next day, it was gone, replaced by other, similarly rarified choices.

It all works because today’s Valencians get excited about such things. And when the America’s Cup comes next summer—and with it what’s expected to be an unprecedented influx of tourists—they are confident that their curiosity will be infectious. ";How can it not be?"; wonders veteran sommelier Manuela Romeralo of La Sucursal. ";People who [come to] this city must open their minds. Architecture to surprise, food to surprise, wine to surprise—that is what we propose.";

Note: In the listings that follow, prices have been converted from euros to U.S. dollars using the exchange rate at press time, U.S. $1 = 0.79 euros and rounded to the nearest dollar.

WHERE TO STAY

Las Arenas
Calle Eugenia Viñes, 22-24
Telephone (011) 34-96-312-60-00
Web site www.hotel-lasarenas.com
Rooms 243
Suites 10
Rates $189-$3,150
Opened in February, this luxurious property, along with the smaller, funkier Neptuno nearby, looks to be the start of a long-needed makeover of the beachfront. Built on the site of a 19th-century bathhouse, it has all the modern amenities, as well as a strip of sand along the Mediterranean.

Hotel Astoria Palace
Plaza de Rodrigo Botet, 5
Telephone (011) 34-96-398-10-00
Web site www.hotel-astoria-palace.com
Rooms 196
Suites 8
Rates $121-$330
The 1950s-style elegance, down to the Mantovani piped into the small lobby, is augmented by a veteran staff that can all but read the minds of its loyal clientele. That’s why top businessmen, tourists and celebrities keep returning to this four-star property in the city center, even with newer, glitzier, five-star choices available. Rooms, done in soft blue, are immaculate and affordable.

Meliá Valencia Palace
Paseo Alameda, 32
Telephone (011) 34-96-337-50-37
Web site www.solmelia.com
Rooms 231
Suites 17
Rates $141-$793
The first five-star hotel in the city when it opened in 1995, this modern, if somewhat faceless, hotel is now a member of the Meliá chain. Still, it remains the choice of celebrities such as Anna Kournikova, Van Morrison and Spain’s royal family, who appreciate the intimate lobby and spacious rooms. Within sight of the City of Arts and Sciences and near many of the city’s best restaurants, the hotel fronts a ribbon of park that has been constructed on the old riverbed.

Palau de la Mar
Carrer Navarro Reverter, 14-16
Telephone (011) 34-96-316-28-84
Web site www.hospes.es/default.aspx
Rooms 60
Suites 6
Rates $208-$819
Valencia’s best hotel since it opened in June 2004, Palau de la Mar fills two adjoining, handsome 19th-century buildings whose exterior could pass for a bank’s. But inside, cubes of light are stacked in the lobby, where antique boards from a ship are inlaid in the marble flooring. An inner courtyard is given a nautical feel with mahogany everywhere and sails canopied overhead to filter the sun. The designer rooms are white-on-white, with vials of high-end bath products. This hotel is suited to the hip and successful and those aspiring to be.

WHERE TO EAT

Albacar
Carrer Sorni, 35
Telephone (011) 34-96-395-10-05
Open Lunch, Monday to Friday; dinner, Monday to Saturday; call ahead for off-season schedule; closed August and for two weeks in April
Cost Entrées $14-$22
Credit cards Visa, American Express
Once one of the city’s most innovative chefs, Tito Albacar has come back from the future. ";Everyone was going one way; he went the other,"; says his brother Salvador, who runs the front of the house. Now the Albacars serve a loyal clientele a menu of traditional Valencian specialities (some of which are as staid as the still lifes on the walls) and perhaps the best paellas and fideo (spaghettilike noodles) in town. They also offer creative specials, such as an intricate dish of scallops, artichokes and curry that at first glance resembles a model of a solar system. The wine list, sadly and unaccountably, provides no vintage information, but boasts 38 Riojas and a strong regional presence, including eight wines from the Utiel-Requena appellation.

Ca Sento
Carrer Mendez Nunez, 17
Telephone (011) 34-96-330-17-75
Open Lunch, Monday to Saturday; dinner, Tuesday to Saturday
Cost Entrées $34-$82; tasting menus $114, $139
Credit cards All major
Valencia’s most celebrated restaurant attracts locals and visitors to its location in a forlorn barrio between the city center and the beach. Fresh seafood is its hallmark, and experimental chef Raul Aleixandre is able to source delicacies such as dátiles del mar, which actually live inside rocks underwater and are so difficult to access that harvesting them has recently been banned. The wine list is as serious as the black card-stock it’s printed on. Champagnes include Moët & Chandon Brut Cuvée Dom Pérignon 1962 ($1,076), Krug Brut Blanc de Blancs Clos du Mesnil 1995 ($760) and Salon Brut Blanc de Blancs Le Mesnil 1995 ($241). Whites run from Domaine de la Romanée-Conti Montrachet 2000 ($2,026) to options far more humble. Spanish choices and reds lean to Vega Sicilia Ribera del Duero and 1990s Bordeaux.

Kailuze
Carrer Gregorio Mayans, 5
Telephone (011) 34-96-374-39-99
Web site www.kailuze.com/english/home.asp
Open Lunch, Monday to Friday; dinner Sunday to Friday; closed August and for one week in March
Cost Entrées $28-$32; tasting menu $100
Credit cards All major
This Basque restaurant envelops you in the warmth of its blue-and-yellow color scheme, the friendly professionalism of its waitstaff and the accessibility of álvaro Oyarbide’s cooking. That’s not to say it isn’t innovative—soy sauce-ginger marinated bonita is laid over greens and topped with a tart apple foam—but even the experiments are rooted in familiar flavors and ingredients. Maximiliano Bao is one of Spain’s rising-star sommeliers, and his thick wine list counts among its 350 selections local standouts like the cultish Mustiguillo Utiel-Requena Quincha Corral 2003 ($76), as well as plenty of Spain’s big-name producers. The printed list doesn’t include the restaurant’s extensive stock of reds from the rest of the world, nor magnums or half-bottles—these are accessible only by request via a personal visit to the cellar.

Riff
Carrer Conde Altea, 18
Telephone (011) 34-96-333-53-53
Open Lunch and dinner, Tuesday to Saturday; closed last two weeks in August
Cost Entrées $23-$33; tasting menus $32-$87
Credit cards All major
Postmodern in concept and execution—from the translucent green curtains segmenting the small dining room to the black bowls containing exactly seven polished stones on each table—Riff feels hip, urban and maybe a little too trendy. But there isn’t more precise, pristine food in the city. Bernd Knoller hails from the heart of the Black Forest, but he has embraced the Mediterranean sensibility with gusto. His chilled vegetable soup featuring marinated sardines, black olives and olive-oil bread would be both familiar and surprising from Marseille to Athens. The wine list is filled with the German, Alsatian and Austrian whites that Knoller believes work best with his cooking, plus Spanish heavyweights such as Bodegas Emilio Moro Ribera del Duero Malleolus de Valderramiro 2001 ($152), Numanthia-Termes Toro Termanthia 2001 ($234) and Bodegas Alejandro Fernández Ribera del Duero Pesquera Reserva 1996 ($126), 1992 ($152) and 1990 ($221) in magnum.

Senzone
Hotel Palau de la Mar, Carrer Navarro Reverter, 14-16
Telephone (011) 34-963-162-884
Open Lunch and dinner, daily
Cost Entrées $28-$34; tasting menu $73
Credit cards All major
Anton Canellas has worked up the coast in Cambrils at both Joan Gatell and Can Bosch, two of Spain’s reference seafood restaurants. At Senzone, he has added meat and rice to his repertoire, but all show his unique touch. Warm bread is made with oranges; red fideo is served with snow peas and a sauce of red pimentón. Cristina Gomez’s 60-entry wine list—divided into imaginative, if not always helpful, categories such as ";wines with religious names or affiliations"; and ";wines made by flying winemakers";—changes what seems to be almost hourly, as new local choices become available.

La Sucursal
Carrer Guillem de Castro, 118
Telephone (011) 34-96-374-66-65
Web site www.restaurantelasucursal.com
Open Lunch, Monday to Friday; dinner, Monday to Saturday; closed first two weeks of August
Cost Entrées $28-$36; tasting menu $82
Credit cards All major
If you think a list of 35 different bottled waters is a pompous affectation, La Sucursal isn’t for you. But if such lack of restraint makes you smile, you’ll love the roaming cart of high-end spirits, the vast selection of Cuban cigars and the aura of glorious excess that infuses the Salvador family’s latest creation. Chef Vicente Torres uses earthy ingredients and cutting-edge technique to create a sort of new-wave Spanish comfort food. Baby goat is accompanied by pumpkin purée and a goat’s- milk foam. Codfish is presented with a Swiss chard emulsion. Short-grained Valencian rice is infused with ginger and served with razor clams and a translucent octopus carpaccio.

Manuela Romeralo’s wine list includes eight vintages of Moët & Chandon Brut Champagne Cuvée Dom Pérignon (1959 to 1980, priced from $633 to $2,279), two pages of Bordeaux and a poem praising Tokaji by Pablo Neruda. But its real strength lies in seldom-seen Spanish offerings, such as a Descendientes de J. Palacios Corullón Las Lamas 2001 ($146) from Bierzo.

Restaurante Oscar Torrijos
Doctor Sumsi, 4
Telephone (011) 34-96-373-29-49
Open Lunch and dinner, Tuesday to Saturday; closed during parts of the year, call ahead for schedule
Cost Small and medium plates, prices vary; tasting menus $57, $82
Credit cards All major
In one of the dining rooms at Restaurante Oscar Torrijos, used mostly for classes, special dinners and tastings included in an ambitious culinary program, logos of great wines of the world are rendered on the ceiling. That sets quite a standard, but this is food to match. Chef Josep Quintana’s concept of a meal begins with a plate of snacks such as crisp bacalao skin served with an intense romesco sauce, followed by four different hunks of rough, li