This, as you might expect, is a wine that pairs best with red meats, but also semi-hard cheeses & cured meats. Bodegas Perica was initially started by Juan Garcia as a small outfit in San Asensio, Rioja, that sold wine for local consumption, & also to neighbouring towns. But Juan was a good businessman & gradually built up his bodega. His son, David Garcia, took over & registered the bodega's name as Perica, which was the nickname he was known by, in 1950. Now it's David's children, the third generation, who run Bodegas Perica. They're based in the Rioja Alta subregion, with over 140 hectares of their own vineyards, all of which are harvested by h&. In the state-or-the-art winery, built in 2011, winemaker Rafel Garcia uses a mixture of French & American oak barrels to fashion wines that have retained the best of the region's tradition, but with a distinctly contemporary twist. Very deep coloured. Powerful sweet aromatics of blackberry, blackcurrant & spice, with some prominent oak. Vivid, dense, structured palate with firm tannins & spicy oak.