This NV La Bota de Palo Cortado 51 Bota comes from a single barrel that was bottled in February 2014 which has been in a solera system for 75 years. Only 1.200 0.375 liter bottles were bottled from Delot No. 51. Simply unique and a collector’s item. Not for nothing got 98 Parker points. A crazy much older (and still to be paid) top sherry is hard to find. What do we taste now: Seawater, iodine, seaweed, oyster shells. This is a wine to be enjoyed. Take small sips and let this affect you. Extremely complex and you realize that something of almost 75-80 years old drinks and that it can taste so delicate and fresh.

98/100 Parker

La Bota de Palo Cortado 51 “Bota GF” is a stable to La Bota de Palo Cortado 41 “Bota NO” and La Bota de Palo Cortado 48 “Bota Punta”, as it has been sourced from another of the butts included in the solera GF-30 kept by Gaspar Florido in its old cellars at Rubiños St, in the very heart of the “Barrio” in Sanlúcar de Barrameda – and later moved to a dilapidated complex on the road to Trebujena which is still in use though no longer as a cell ringing facility. It was in the latter that we had the opportunity to sample it for the first time with our erudite friend Álvaro Girón on a visit to the already aging Gaspar in June 2006. We were seriously impressed by the consistently high quality of those venerably old wines which so openly contrasted with the – let us be child and go with “less noble” –venue. There were several GF-25 butts and only a few of the so-called GF-30, a spectacular old wine, which is exactly what we are bottling again, now as our release number 51.

Until 2013-2014, these butts have rested at the sacristy of Bodegas Pedro Romero, back to the “Barrio” and in fact very close to their original location. It was there we encountered them again and proceeded to sample them exhaustively in order to choose our favorite ones. Our label legend “Bota GF” is or course our fashion tribute to the original wine and its maker until 2007.

Together with the rest of the releases in this short series, La Bota de Palo Cortado 51 “Bota GF” gives us an increasingly rare opportunity to encapsulate and enjoy a little sample of the history of the Sherry district. We are talking about releases 41, 47, 48, 49, and 51: their estimated average age range from 50 – in the case of the youngest – to 80 years. There is simply not that much venerably old wine left around anymore, not to mention as balanced and harmonious as these; not just in the combined cellars of Jerez, El Puerto and Sanlúcar, and we fear that the chances of having access to jewels such as these are unlikely to abound in the future – especially at these prices and in lots of multiple wines of the same breed for us to compare.