Oloroso

Oloroso

What it is

Oloroso is fortified to seventeen degrees or more at the outset, above what the flor yeast can survive, so it never grows a veil and oxidises from its first year in cask. Oloroso means fragrant, and the confusion follows from there: it smells of raisin and walnut and is, in the classic style, bone dry — the sweet supermarket bottle is oloroso with syrup added afterwards.

In the kitchen

This is the sherry with body — glycerol and extract — so it thickens a braise where an amontillado would read thin. Reduce it with oxtail or beef-cheek liquor and resist adding sugar to chase the sweetness the nose promised.

Goes with

Oxtail Beef cheek Button mushroom Walnut Onion Black pepper

Same species

Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale DOP Amontillado Armagnac Banyuls Brandy de Jerez Champagne vinegar

Also used with

Rubia Gallega old-cow beef Lomo embuchado Presa ibérica Salchichón

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