Things You'll Need:
- Manzanilla sherry
- Oloroso sherry
- Pedro Ximenez sherry
- 2 sherry glasses
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Step 1
Understand the "solera" system of sherry-making. The main way in which regular wine-making and sherry-making differs is in the sherry producer's use of the "solera" system of aging. The "solera" is a series of oak barrels lying on their sides stacked one on top of the other. They form rows that go as far as five barrels high. When new sherry is fermented, it is added to the top barrel. To make room for the new sherry in the top barrel, a little bit of the sherry from the top barrel is taken out and put in the barrel below it. A little sherry from that second-from-the-top row is then taken out and added to the barrel below that and so on until they reach the bottom barrel. The sherry that is removed from these barrels is taken out and bottled. Therefore, there is always at least a tiny bit of sherry in the bottom barrel that has been there since the very first bottling of sherry from that bodega.
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Step 2
Tasting the Manzanilla and understanding "flor." Manzanilla is the driest of all sherries. This is because of where it is made and what happens there organically. All sherry is from the area known as Jerez de la Frontera, but Manzanilla can only be made in one town inside Jerez called Sanlúcar de Barrameda. This seaside town is very humid. Because of this humidity, a natural foam from the fermented yeast cells forms on the surface of the sherry in the solera barrels. This is called "flor," which literally means flower. This flor seals off the sherry from the oxygen in the air, keeping the sherry in the barrels crisp, delicate and unoxidized. Open your bottle of Manzanilla and open the bottle of Oloroso. Pour a bit into each glass. The first thing you will notice is the difference in color: Manzanilla is lighter and Oloroso is darker. Now smell and sip each. The Manzanilla's scents are delicate and almost saline, while the Oloroso will smell like caramel and hazelnut. On the palate, Manzanilla will have the taste of green olive, almond and even sea foam, while Oloroso will be sweeter and have heavier notes of burnt sugar and dried fruit. This is due to the oxidization that the Oloroso goes through that the Manzanilla does not.
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Step 3
Taste the Pedro Ximenez and understand the difference in grapes used to make sherry. Most sherries are made primarily from the Palomino grape. The Pedro Ximenez grape is used in sweeter sherries like Olorosos and cream sherries as a blending grape to add a little sweetness but never makes up more than 15% of the total blend. Only in the rare Pedro Ximenez sherry is the grape used all by itself. This sherry is made from sun-dried Pedro Ximenez grapes that are high in sugar and intensity. The resulting wine is as thick as syrup and sweet enough to have as dessert all by itself.
