Malvasía volcánica: the grape that grows in the ash

About twenty producers work Malvasía volcánica, and the same grape runs from dry to sweet and on to sparkling. It grows in hoyos dug under the ash.

Malvasía volcánica is the flagship variety of the island's wine, and about twenty businesses work it, from wineries with a restaurant to the wine shop that opens at night in Puerto del Carmen. The vine itself lives inside a hoyo. It grows tucked down inside, with the hole filled in with volcanic sand and ringed by a curved wall of stone, and none of this is decoration. The wall breaks the Atlantic wind and the ash holds the little rain that falls. In the press the island comes across as the kingdom of Malvasía, as La Razón wrote when it reviewed Tisalaya's pure Diego.

And the same grape ends up in very different wines. There are dry, semi-sweet and sweet wines, sparklings, wines raised in clay tinajas and others in egg-shaped concrete tanks. That spread of styles is the first thing that throws off anyone who knows the grape by name.

From dry to sparkling

The proof is in the shops. Bodega La Geria sells Malvasía volcánica as a whole family, from dry white to sweet, with a line of its own, Manto, and a limited-edition sweet, the Antigua.

El Grifo doesn't stop at bottling, and characterising its aromas sits among its research projects. The shop carries six Malvasía volcánica wines on sale, among them two sparklings, a white called Lías and a co-fermentation, with a semi-sweet announced as coming soon. Vulcano presents the variety as the island's native grape and the main grape in its whites, and its young wine comes out in several batches a year. Its trick is a "must bank" of its own, grape must kept cold. The house says it was the first winery to have one.

Tisalaya blends it with Diego in its white La Vegueta, and at La Florida, in El Islote, they bottle it on its own, with a hundred-percent Malvasía volcánica in their Jameo range.

And at some houses the grape goes experimental. At Jable de Tao they harvest it alongside Listán negro and ferment it in a clay tinaja, over jable, the island's pale sand. At Tinguatón, La Verea describes its Tabaiba as 94% Malvasía volcánica and 6% Listán blanco, raised in a concrete egg, from vines more than seventy years old, and posts a tasting note on its website, where they present it as fresh, with grapefruit and citrus, unctuous and with a touch of salinity. From the same house comes the Nubium, a sparkling made by the ancestral method with 30% Malvasía volcánica.

Where to taste it

Tasting it is the easy part. There are tastings with published prices, glasses inside and outside the wineries, and visits that run every day.

The Testeina workshop is the most direct plan for the grape itself. It's four Malvasía volcánica wines from Bodegas Vega de Yuco, glass by glass, on a finca from the 16th century beside the La Geria road. Because it takes place one day a week and in English, it pays to check the calendar before building the day around it.

At El Grifo the Malvasía sparklings open the five-wine tasting, and the audio guide is the lightest plan with a glass included. The winery and wine bar close at the weekend, and if you arrive without a booking, the audio guide is bought at the shop when there's a slot free.

Bodega La Geria puts on a guided visit every day, with places on sale twelve days before the date, and asks you to write by email for groups of more than eight. The house warns that the tour is not accessible for anyone who walks with difficulty, and presents it as the way to see the growing techniques and the famous Malvasía wine first-hand.

David Fernández receives visitors in Guatiza with a tasting and visit in groups of ten at most. It's the handiest case for seeing the grape where it grows, because his website places the Malvasía volcánica plots in the Los Rostros and La Hoya de la Perra areas, in Mancha Blanca, at the foot of Timanfaya national park, and explains that he makes the wine by hand, plot by plot, with the winery built into the volcanic rock.

The Vulcano tour goes out once a month, organised with the company Wine Tours Lanzarote. It lasts about three hours between the Masdache vineyard and the Tías winery, with a tasting of four of its wines alongside goat's cheese from Lanzarote, led by a professional certified by the WSET. Eight seats at most, open from age 12, and under-18s are served soft drinks. It leaves at 10:00 from the Puerto del Carmen secondary school, with an alternative point at the Tías winery five minutes later.

And if the plan is a whole day, the same company operates daily tours with three vineyards, six tastings of wine and goat's cheese in groups of up to eight people, with pickup and return guaranteed.

By the glass, the scene changes. El Grifo's wine bar is, according to the house, inside the winery grounds, and is open from Monday to Friday. La Rika, in Puerto del Carmen, serves from 19:00 to 23:00, Monday to Saturday, with signature tapas and tables booked over WhatsApp. Winelanz, in Uga, is a shop with private tastings and open samplings. And at the Monumento al Campesino, the Casa del Vino Canario holds tastings from 30 € to 50 € with the sommelier Vicenta Mira, where Malvasía volcánica is tasted next to Listán negro and Negramoll. It closes on Saturday and Sunday.

La Florida, in El Islote, receives only with a booking made in advance by email, and the route runs through vineyards, a volcanic jameo and gardens, with a wine tasting and a board of Canary cheeses. It's a group visit, with no published price.

And five houses remain with visits unconfirmed. Los Bermejos, in San Bartolomé, opens mornings only, Monday to Friday. Olivina, in Guatiza, keeps short windows around midday. Guiguan, in Tajaste, splits its slots between midday and early afternoon. Tisalaya, in Tinajo, publishes no opening times. And Lágrima de Malvasía, in Arrecife, is a house of wines and vinegars that opens on weekday mornings. Roca Negra, in Masdache, announces visits and tastings of organic wines on its website and gives no times. Titerok-Akaet completes the twenty with its wines to order online.

Where to start

If the trip already has a date, the shortcut is Bodega La Geria, which opens all seven days of the week, with a guided visit and a shop to take a bottle home. If you want to taste the variety against itself, the Testeina workshop fits four Malvasía volcánica wines into an hour and a half. And if what you're after is a single glass, El Grifo's wine bar and La Rika sort it without a visit or a plan.

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