Food & Wine USA - (10)October 2020

OCTOBER 2020 63

La Bodega de Santiago, a terrific restaurant in tiny Yaiza, but

the place was empty. The tomatoes, cheeses, roast goat, and

papas arrugadas, the gorgeous local potatoes doused in mojo,

a lightly spiced garlic sauce, were still being prepared. It was

7:30 p.m., but even 800 miles from the mainland, this was still

Spain. We were invited to wait. We did.

In that 200-year-old house, we drank only Lanzarote wines.

But fine-dining restaurants have a different notion of “local,”

and at Isla de Lobos the next night, we were able to crisscross

the archipelago without leaving our table overlooking the ocean.

A light, floral white from Tagalguén, on La Palma, was followed

by a gorgeously complex and aromatic wine called Agala Altitud

1318, from Gran Canaria’s Bodegas Bentayga. It went beautifully

with delicately sauced prawns. And a Meursault-like white from

Los Loros in Tenerife was so good that, three days and two fer-

ries later, we were driving almost vertically up a sunny hill,

looking for the winemaker. We didn’t find him because the

winery was closed. (Lesson learned: Always call first.) But at

Kabuki, a Michelin-starred restaurant on Tenerife’s southwest

coast, we were happily reunited with his wines. “Locals don’t

believe the wines here are good, but foreign guests are very

interested,” Tara Hernández-Monzón, Kabuki’s sommelier, told

us as she matched Japanese dishes to local wines. More fool

them, I thought: Two fish-obsessed archipelagos meeting at the

dinner table was a remarkable experience.

“It’s true,” said Roberto Santana of Envínate, a joint venture

by four impassioned young winemakers in different parts of

Spain. “People here don’t believe.” A note of sadness at this

situation colored his voice. At Tenerife’s center, the Teide volcano

rears up, its slopes nourishing Europe’s highest vineyards. The

warm south of the island may have spectacular beaches, but

drive north and the road rises, the air cools, the scenery grows

lush—this is Tenerife’s great terroir. From Listán Prieto vines

that are a century old, growing through a layer of sand from

Teide’s last eruption in 1909, Santana makes Benje: a lightly

balsamic red with a splash of sour cherry. Migan, a spicy Listán

Negro he makes, is also lovely. In fact, all his wines seem to

vibrate with a beguiling combination of ancient turmoil and

modern excitement.

At Suertes del Marqués, vines roll down another impossibly

steep hillside toward the north coast, some so old they were

thicker than my wrist. “It’s hard making wine here,” Jonatan

García Lima said. “Everything sprouts. We cut the grass 10 times

a year!” But he doesn’t compromise, picking by hand, pressing

by foot. “I’m not here to make money,” he added with a shrug.

“I’m here because I love it.” That passion is evident: From the

7 Fuentes “village wine” to the array of elegant single-vineyard

bottlings, his wines are stupendous.

In Las Aguas village, we paused for one last meal. There, on

the roof of Mesón Casa Mi Madre, eating crisp, fried fish and

the aforementioned local dish of papas arrugadas, watching

the tumbling ocean, I wondered how many of those long-ago

intrepid adventurers resumed their journey reluctantly. Sun-

soaked beaches, great food and wine, unforgettable scenery,

and volcanic eruptions: What more could the world’s farthest

corners have possibly had to offer?

clockwise from center: The Teide volcano on Tenerife

overlooks a vast national park and some of Europe’s high-

est vineyards; El Grifo has a charming cellar door, wine

bar, and wine museum on Lanzarote; its workers harvest

the grapes from their unique circular craters by hand.

PHOTOGRAPHY (CLOCKWISE FROM BOTTOM): COURTESY OF EL GRIFO, GETTY IMAGES/EYEEM PREMIUM, UNIVERSAL IMAGES GROUP/GETTY IMAGES