DO El Hierro

DO El Hierro

SOURCES

Fifty years ago an outsider to our Island of El Hierro was surprised that in all the houses I visited send it to the child, or the grandfather, the winery for wine. But, by hot the day was, never gave him water, a liquid much more scarce. The wine was a product home, a food essential and appreciated. There were a few families in each village, however, they had wine cellars that are more ambitious than they sold wine in the Island and also outside. Even came gums and palm trees to the villages to carry off the surplus. In the seventies began to notice the change, demographic, social and economic. The Island accusing the decline of the population because of emigration to Venezuela, the communications with the “outside world” improved, roads were built and put light and municipal water to the houses, and, of course, the wine-growing sector (if you could call a “slice”) was affected. It was a question, not to adapt, or to be renewed, but to start from scratch again.

In the eighties, the years of full euphoria co-operative, the Council of The Iron promoted the establishment of the Central Wine-growing Cooperative in the Field of the Border and, with facilities and machinery are modern, in 1986 with the grapes of 93 growers were elaborated the first wines of the new era. It is marketed under the label of “Wine Herreño” and soon saw that it was necessary an Appellation of Origin to be able to compete in a market that is becoming increasingly liberalized and interconnected. In 1990 it approves the constitution of the Specific Name of The Iron, promoted by the Central Wine country, and between 1994 and 1996 following the steps to create definitely the Appellation of Origin, The Iron with its corresponding Regulatory Council. Depend on the Canarian Institute of Food Quality.

A BIT OF HISTORY

Although it was one of the first islands become colonized say that our first vineyard is not planted until more than a century later, precisely in the year 1526, and, in addition, for a English of Taunton. This John Hill, so called, appears fifty years later, imprisoned by the Inquisition for gamberradas, probably under the influence of the product of his plantation. Or this was your child? Be that as it may, at least his love for the vineyard and the wine-what we have inherited, in addition to devote a promontory – the Tip Juanil.

Little by little the wine came to be fundamental to the economy and to the growth of the population. In the mid-17th century, the wine production amounted to 1,200 pips, which is equivalent to about 60,000 litres, and we were already exporting surplus wine and spirits to the New World. In the first half of the 19th century, our cellars were producing the almost incredible volume of between one and a half million and two million litres each year, with half to be distilled. Embarked for Tenerife a good part of the wine and brandy from the Customs House, today the smallest hotel in the world, in The Tips, in the eastern part of the Gulf.

The year 1852 was the year of fateful. A disease, powdery mildew, caused by a fungus from America, attacked our vineyards for the first time. The following year he had infected the majority of the vineyards, and in 1859 our total production of wine had fallen to just 3,000 litres. A few years later another disease american, the mildew, the third, came to us, also with disastrous consequences. But not all the bad things we touch: the second plague of the other side of the pond, the phylloxera, which at the same time, destroyed the european vineyards, has never reached the Canary Islands. Because of this, our island is a kind of botanical conservatory. Until now we have continued growing a few varieties originating prefiloxeras which gradually have followed an evolution of something different to their cousins in the other islands and much more of their premiums second of the iberian peninsula.

But the islanders are stubborn. If these disasters put a stop to the winery business of the large owners, the people simply relocated the production as a home activity. Proof of this is the large number of wine-presses, individual and communal in all the villages. On the other hand, seldom was the house that did not have their own “piece” of the vineyard, your wine cellar, or at least your barrel. With the time, there were new wine exporters, mainly to The neighbouring island of la Gomera, Tenerife and Gran Canaria, although they never regained the great popularity and enormous economic weight of the first half of the previous century.

In 1986, he launched the Central Wine-producing Island, and in 1994 the Appellation of Origin of Wines of The Iron. These two facts meant a change in the orientation of the wine sector in our island towards wines of better quality and more suited to modern tastes. Today our soups are adepts where we have been.

Concejo Regulador DO El Hierro

Listado DOPs - IGPs de Vinos Registradas por la European Comisión

Órganos de Gestión de las Denominaciones de Origen Protegidas Vitivinícolas

Mapa de las Denominaciones de Origen Protegidas de Vinos de Espana

BODEGA COOPERATIVA FRONTERA

Marcas: Frontera

Direccion: El Matorral, s/n. 38911. Frontera

Teléfono: 922 556 016

Página web: www.cooperativafrontera.com

BODEGA TANAJARA

Marcas:

Direccion: Travesía del Pino, s/n. 38914. El Pinar

Teléfono: 922 828 768, 922 829 936

Página web: www.tanajara.com

BODEGA EL TESORO

Marcas: El Tesoro

Direccion: Calle Jesús Nazareno, 4, Apto. 12-H. 38900. Valverde

Teléfono: 922 550 259