Spotlight on Spain: The Islands
🌍🍷 The next chapter of our ongoing “Wines of the World Series”, Spanish edition, takes us to the islands: the Canaries off in the Atlantic and the Balearics right in the middle of the Mediterranean.Â
đź“– Spanish Islands key facts:
The Balearics form two groups: the Gymnesian Islands (Mallorca, Menorca, Cabrera) and the Pityusic Islands (Ibiza, Formentera and smaller islets). They are mostly flat, apart from Mallorca, and shaped by the northerly Tramontana wind and the Embat sea breeze, with the red call vermell signature soils.
Both Balearic DOs are on Mallorca: DO Binissalem and DO Pla i Llevant. Around them sit six Vi de la Terra (PGI) categories: Illes Balears, Mallorca, Serra de Tramuntana, Illa de Menorca, Eivissa (Ibiza) and Formentera. Native grapes include Manto Negro, Callet and Prensal Blanc, plus the rarer Fogoneu, Gorgollassa and GirĂł Ros.
The Canaries are subtropical, cooled by Atlantic trade winds and still volcanically active, with volcanic soils dominating alongside some clay and sand. Over 80 varieties have been identified, including the whites MalvasĂa Volcánica, MalvasĂa Aromática, Listán Blanco (Palomino Fino), as well as the reds Listán Negro, Listán Prieto, and Negramoll, among others.
The Canary Islands are home to 11 DOs: Abona, El Hierro, Gran Canaria, Islas Canarias, La Gomera, La Palma, Lanzarote, Tacoronte-Acentejo, Valle de GĂĽĂmar, Valle de la Orotava and Ycoden-Daute-Isora. DOP Islas Canarias, known as Canary Wine, spans the whole archipelago.
🔎 Did you know?
Before phylloxera arrived in the late 19th century, mighty Mallorca had around 27,000 hectares of vines and exported some 300,000 hl of wine a year. In 2024, the Balearics’ quality-wine vineyards covered 2,169 hectares in total.
In Tenerife’s Valle de la Orotava, vines are trained in cordón trenzado: shoots from successive years are braided together like rope, forming cords that can stretch up to 15 metres.
Listán Prieto, one of the Canaries’ red grapes, is the same variety as Chile’s PaĂs and California’s Mission, carried across the Atlantic by Spanish settlers.
Canary wine was the toast of Shakespeare’s England. In Twelfth Night, Sir Toby Belch calls for “a cup of canary.”
🎓Want to learn more?
Explore the Foods and Wines from Spain website
➡️ Coming up next: The Mediterranean Coast