The Best Aged Albariños to Buy Right Now

Bright, crisp, white wines — the Sauvignon Blancs, Rieslings, and Albariños of the world — are usually best unadorned: no oak barrel influence, nothing that gets in the way of their fresh, vivid appeal. And yet, many of the top Albariños from Spain’s coastal Rías Baixas region are aged on their lees before bottling, a technique more often associated with rich white Burgundies or California Chardonnays than with zesty coastal whites.

In winemaking, lees are the spent yeasts from fermentation; once yeasts convert the sugar in grape juice to alcohol, they die off and settle to the bottom of the fermentation vessel, whether that’s an oak barrel or a stainless steel tank.

Classically, for a variety like Albariño, a winemaker would rack off the wine (i.e., transfer it from one vessel to another, leaving the sediment behind) before letting it age until it was ready to bottle. But leaving the wine in contact with the lees can do some magical things: It adds roundness and texture to the mouthfeel, helps protect the wine from future oxidation, and can impart a distinctive savory edge to its flavors — think baked bread, nuts, and a kind of overall umami depth. 

In regions like Burgundy, lees aging (or keeping the wine sur lie, if you prefer the French) is typically done in oak barrels. But in Rías Baixas, this stage of the winemaking typically occurs in a neutral tank; stainless steel, most often, but also granite or even neutral wood like a large, old, chestnut barrel.

In a sense, the winemaker’s choice to work this way gives the wine the best of both worlds; it preserves, for Albariño, its innate grapefruit-to-pineapple brightness and salty minerality, but adds surprising layers of complexity. Here are nine terrific bottles to check out.

2024 Pazo das Bruxas Albariño, DO Rías Baixas ($25)

Pazo das Bruxas is the entry-level wine from the Torres family’s project in Rías Baixas, a grapefruity, melony Albariño that’s a blend of O Rosal and Val do Salnés fruit. It’s tart and refreshing, ideal for raw seafood of any kind. For more depth and complexity, seek out the pricier Pazo Torre Panelas Blanco Granito Albariño ($60), which comes from a single vineyard in the Val do Salnés and is fermented (and aged on the lees for eight months) in granite eggs.

2024 Quinta de Couselo Rosal ($25)

A tiny touch of Loureiro and Caiño Blanco gives this white from the O Rosal zone in Rías Baixas a lightly herbal/floral fragrance, while six months aging on fine lees adds presence to the palate. It’s crisp and zippy, in other words, but with some richness as well.

2024 Granbazán Etiqueta Ámbar Albariño ($27)

Granbazán’s Etiqueta Ambar sources grapes from vineyards that are at least 40 years old, mostly in Cambados and Meandro in the Salnés Valley. The juice undergoes a few hours of skin contact before fermentation, and then receives eight months of aging on lees in stainless steel tanks, resulting in an elegant, lemon blossom–scented white.

2022 Fillaboa Selección Finca Monte Alto Albariño ($35)

A single small plot of vines on the Fillaboa estate along the River Miño is the source for this always-impressive Albariño. Ripe citrus and melon notes blend on the palate, along with tingly citrus-peel acidity. Finca Monte Alto is also a wine that can develop impressively for several years in a wine fridge, if you want to put a few bottles away.

NV Paco & Lola ‘Lola’ Sparkling Albariño ($42)

A full two years on the lees in the bottle gives this impressive sparkling Albariño deep yeasty/baked bread notes, which lead into the fresh grapefruit-inflected flavor. Anyone looking for a cool Champagne alternative (or Prosecco alternative, or any other kind of sparkling wine alternative) should check this one out.

2023 Nanclares y Prieto ‘O Bocoi Vella de Silvia’ Rías Baixas Albariño ($45)

Alberto Nanclares and Silvia Prieto take a hands-off approach to winemaking (native yeasts, minimal sulfur use, no additives of any kind) for their entire range of Albariños, which come from organically farmed, old-vine parcels. For this lightly oxidative, richly flavorful white, the wine finishes fermentation in a single 90-year-old chestnut barrel, then rests on the lees there for 9 months.

2022 Attis Embaixador Albariño ($53)

A single vineyard of 60-year-old vines in the Val do Salnés region provides the grapes for this potent, full-bodied Albariño, its richness lifted by scintillating acidity. It spends two years on its lees, the first in granite tanks and then in stainless steel. This is a main-course Albariño — or, serve it with a platter of classic, smoked paprika-spiced pulpo a la gallega.

2021 Pazo Barrantes Gran Vino Albariño ($55)

Most Albariños are put on the market as soon as possible, but Pazo Barrantes prefers to hold their wines back, allowing them to develop complexity over time in the winery’s cellar before they are released. This vintage has a pretty nose of savory herbs, with round tangerine and grapefruit flavors, and a light nutty note from lees aging. Most of it is made in stainless steel tanks, but 15% is aged in acacia wood barrels.

2015 Pazo de Señoráns Selección de Añada Albariño ($89)

The grapes for Pazo de Señoráns’ top wine, Selección de Añada, are grown on a small, old-vine parcel directly behind the winery, on shallow soils over what is effectively a solid layer of granite. The wine stays in stainless steel tanks on its lees for fully two and a half years before bottling.

“When we started making Selección Añada in 1995, people thought it was odd,” says winemaker Ana Quintela Suárez. “White wines were all supposed to be young. What I want to recall is the ancient Albariño style, from a time when the wine was kept in big wooden tanks. It’s a rounder, richer style, perhaps not with such fresh fruit, but with much more elegance.”

That’s entirely true of this vintage, and while the wine isn’t inexpensive, it’s one of the great white wines of Spain, and not to be missed.