Named after a hillside vineyard located on the northeastern slope of the Yerga mountain in eastern Rioja, La Montesa is a blend of the indigenous grape varieties that grow on the Palacios Remondo estate. Estate-grown Garnacha and Tempranillo clusters were selected first in the field and again on a sorting table, before being de-stemmed and put separately into stainless steel tanks for a spontaneous alcoholic and malolactic fermentation. After a long maceration of 35 days, an initial blend was made and the wine was aged for 12 months in new and used 90% French and 10% American oak barrels.

93 Points - Robert Parker's Wine Advocate

The quality/price champion 2018 La Montesa is now 100% Garnacha from organically farmed vineyards from the 100-hectare family property that gives the wine its name. It fermented with indigenous yeasts in stainless steel vats and matured in barriques, 85% of them produced with French oak and the rest with American oak. It feels very young, and the oak is still present; and the American oak, which is spicy and smoky, with ashy incense and vanilla with some sweet undertones, gives it a character that brings back the character of the traditional wines from yesteryear in a very clean way. It has vibrant freshness and should develop nicely with a couple of years in bottle. It has great purity and typicity, less Mediterranean than the 2017, nicely textured, velvety. I think the breakthrough vintage for this wine was 2015. This has all the grapes that would have been used for the Propiedad label, which was not bottled separately in 2018. It carries the EU organic-farming label. It's quite impressive for the quantity they produce—700,000 bottles. They started bottling in April 2020 from a single master blend. I tasted one of the first bottles.