The Daughter, the Garage & the Diminutive Grape That Rebelled
In La Mancha, where the suffix "-eja" turns a grape into something smaller, softer, and more stubborn, Eva Imedio and Venancio Castillo make zero-additive wine in the literal garage of their family home — organic Airén and Cencibel from calcareous soils, bottled with no sulphites, no filtration, and the unapologetic spirit of the black sheep.
Origin — 2018, the Family Tradition & the Garage
Eva Imedio Sobrino is not a winemaker who arrived from outside. She is a daughter who returned. In 2018, she made a decision that would reshape her family's relationship with the land: she would recover the family viticultural tradition and begin working the vineyard herself — not as a hobby, not as a side project, but as a calling. For four years, she tended the vines, learned the rhythms of the calcareous soil, and listened to what the Airén and Cencibel had to say. Then, in 2022, accompanied and encouraged by her family, she launched the project officially: La Uveja Negra.
Venancio Castillo Naranjo is her partner in the project — a collaborator in the vineyard and the cellar, sharing the labour and the vision. Together, they are a small team in a small space, making small quantities of wine with an intensity that large bodegas cannot replicate. Their winery is not a castle. It is not an industrial facility. It is, as they describe it with disarming honesty, "literalmente en el garaje de nuestra vivienda familiar" — literally in the garage of their family home. The tanks sit next to the car. The bottles stack against the wall. The fermentation aromas drift into the kitchen. It is not romantic. It is real.
The name La Uveja Negra is a linguistic game rooted in the dialect of La Mancha. In this region, the suffix "-ejo, -eja" is a diminutive applied to everyday words — a way of making things smaller, softer, more intimate. Uveja is the diminutive of uva — not merely a grape, but a little grape, a stubborn grape, a grape that refuses to be big and important. But the name also plays on oveja negra — the black sheep — that character of rebellion and difference that every family knows and every tradition fears. Eva and Venancio are the black sheep of La Mancha wine: they do not make bulk wine. They do not fortify. They do not add sulphites. They make wine in a garage, and they are proud of it.
The family is the foundation. Eva recovered the tradition. Venancio joined her in the work. The parents, the siblings, the children — everyone is part of the project, whether tending vines, stacking bottles, or simply eating together at the table where the wine is opened and judged. It is a project of return, of recovery, of refusing to let the family vineyard become another statistic in the industrialisation of Spanish wine.
The Place — La Mancha, the Calcareous & the Family Vineyard
Castilla-La Mancha is the largest wine-producing region in Spain — a vast, high, arid plateau of extremes, where the summer sun blasts the earth at 40°C and the winter wind freezes it at -10°C. It is a landscape of windmills, olive groves, and endless horizons — the setting of Don Quixote's madness and the source of more bulk wine than any other region in Europe. But within this industrial sea, there are islands of intention: small family vineyards, old vines, calcareous soils, and the stubborn belief that La Mancha can produce wine of character, not merely volume.
Calcareous Soils & the White Dust of La Mancha
The vineyard sits on calcareous soils — the white, chalky earth that defines the best terroirs of La Mancha, rich in calcium carbonate and poor in organic matter. The calcareous soil reflects sunlight back into the canopy, increasing photosynthesis. It retains moisture in the dry season, providing a lifeline to the vines when rainfall is scarce. And it gives the wines a distinct chalky minerality and saline freshness — a texture of wet stone and dried earth that is the signature of the region's most honest wines. Eva's Cencibel Joven is explicitly noted as coming from tierras calizas — calcareous land — and that calcium is the invisible ingredient in every bottle.
Airén — The Most Planted, the Most Maligned
Airén is the most planted white grape variety in Spain — and arguably the most misunderstood. For decades, it has been used almost exclusively for bulk wine, brandy distillation, and anonymous blends. But in the hands of small, attentive producers, Airén reveals a surprising delicacy: citrus, white flowers, almond, and a gentle herbal note that speaks of the Mediterranean sun without collapsing into heat. Eva and Venancio's Airén — El Jalbegandero — is a declaration of independence for the grape: no sulphites, no filtration, no fortification, just the pure expression of a variety that has spent too long in the shadow of industrial agriculture.
Cencibel — Tempranillo by Another Name
Cencibel is the local name for Tempranillo in La Mancha — the great Spanish red grape, here expressed through the lens of calcareous soils and extreme continental climate. The Cencibel at La Uveja Negra is young, fresh, and honest — not aged in expensive oak, not manipulated with enzymes or selected yeasts, but fermented spontaneously and bottled young to preserve the red-fruit purity that defines the variety at its best. The Cencibel + Cabernet Sauvignon blend introduces a touch of international structure without losing the Manchegan identity — a marriage of local tradition and global curiosity.
Organic, Family-Farmed, Zero Chemicals
The vineyard is farmed organically — no herbicides, no pesticides, no synthetic fertilisers. The family tends the vines by hand, harvests by hand, and transports the grapes in small containers to the garage winery. There is no machinery beyond the essential. There is no consultant beyond the family table. The farming is not certified biodynamic or adorned with preparations. It is simply clean, attentive, and traditional — the way the grandparents farmed, the way Eva is reviving, and the way the children will inherit.
Winemaking — Mínima Intervención, the Garage & No Shortcuts
Eva and Venancio's philosophy is stated with the directness of people who have no marketing department: "vinos de mínima intervención en un proceso artesanal." Wines of minimum intervention, made by hand. There is no chaptalisation, no acidification, no selected yeast, no enzymatic correction, no fining, no filtration, and no added sulphites in any wine. The grapes are hand-harvested, gently pressed or crushed, and fermented spontaneously with the yeasts that live on the skins and in the garage air. The result is wine in its most honest form: fermented grape juice, the product of calcareous soil, family attention, and the refusal to take shortcuts.
The winemaking is deliberately garage-scale. Fermentation occurs in small stainless steel tanks — the kind that fit in a family garage, not a commercial warehouse. Temperature is not artificially controlled; the garage provides its own coolness in winter and its own warmth in summer. The wines are racked by gravity, aged briefly in tank, and bottled when they are stable — not according to a commercial calendar, but according to the wine's own rhythm. Eva and Venancio care for every process to the maximum, complying with demanding sanitary standards so that the wine, once made, shows its varietal and terroir expression without the mask of additives.
Their commitment extends from vineyard to bottle. "Nos comprometemos a garantizar la calidad de nuestros vinos desde el viñedo hasta la botella." They use carefully selected cultivation and harvest techniques in a completely artisanal process, both in production and in bottling, so that each bottle arrives in optimal conditions. It is not a slogan. It is a contract with the drinker — a promise that the wine in your glass has been touched only by hands, by time, and by the natural chemistry of fermentation.
Their radicalism is quiet. They do not shout about being natural. They do not seek certifications or awards. They simply make wine the way their family has always made it — or rather, the way their family used to make it before industrial agriculture convinced everyone that wine needed help. Eva recovered the tradition. Venancio helps her honour it. And the garage, with its concrete floor and its smell of fermentation, is their cathedral.
The Wines — From the Little Grape to the Black Sheep
La Uveja Negra produces a small, focused range of wines from their family vineyard in Castilla-La Mancha — all organic, artisanal, and without added sulphites. The range is deliberately compact: a white Airén, a red Cencibel, a red blend, and a sparkling — each expressing a different facet of the family's philosophy and the calcareous terroir. The wines are bottled young, fresh, and honest — made for the table, not for the cellar; for the family, not for the critic.
La Uveja Negra "El Jalbegandero"
Airén white — Castilla-La ManchaThe estate's flagship white — 100% Airén from organically farmed vines on calcareous soils, made without added sulphites and with artisanal, minimal-intervention winemaking. The name El Jalbegandero is a playful Manchegan reference — jalbegar means to whitewash or to plaster, a nod to the white calcareous soils and the white-washed walls of the region. Hand-harvested, gently pressed, and fermented spontaneously in small tanks. The result is a wine of surprising freshness and clarity — lemon, green almond, white flowers, and a distinct chalky minerality that prevents the fruit from becoming simple. Light-bodied, crisp, and deeply drinkable. A wine for grilled fish, gazpacho, and long afternoons. Zero sulphites, zero filtration, zero fining.
La Uveja Negra "Cencibel Joven"
Cencibel red — Castilla-La ManchaA 100% Cencibel (Tempranillo) of extraordinary honesty and immediacy — sourced from calcareous soils, farmed organically, and made with the same zero-additive discipline as the rest of the range. Joven means young — the wine is not aged in oak, not manipulated with wood flavours, but bottled fresh to preserve the pure, red-fruit character of the grape. The nose is of red cherry, pomegranate, dried herbs, and a touch of the white dust that defines La Mancha. The palate is light-to-medium-bodied, juicy, and savoury — a Tempranillo that drinks like the countryside rather than the laboratory. For tapas, for grilled meats, for the Sunday table. Zero sulphites, zero filtration.
La Uveja Negra "Cencibel + Cabernet Sauvignon"
Red blend — Castilla-La ManchaA 50/50 blend of Cencibel and Cabernet Sauvignon — the local and the international, married in equal parts and bottled young. The Cencibel provides red-fruit freshness, Mediterranean herb, and the chalky minerality of the calcareous soils. The Cabernet Sauvignon adds structure, dark berry depth, and a touch of blackcurrant leaf. Together, they produce a wine of greater complexity than either variety alone — youthful, approachable, and deeply satisfying. It is a wine that acknowledges the world beyond La Mancha without forgetting where it comes from. Made with the same artisanal, zero-additive discipline. Zero sulphites, zero filtration.
La Uveja Negra "Airén Pomposo"
Sparkling Airén — Castilla-La ManchaA sparkling wine made from 100% Airén — the most unlikely sparkling grape in Spain, transformed by Eva and Venancio into a wine of joy and effervescence. The name Pomposo is ironic and celebratory — pompous, grand, but made in a garage from a grape that the world ignores. Fermented with indigenous yeasts and bottled with natural CO₂, it is a pet-nat or ancestral-method sparkling of extraordinary freshness — citrus, green apple, white flowers, and a prickly, persistent mousse that makes every occasion feel like a family celebration. For aperitifs, for toasts, for proving that Airén can be anything. Zero sulphites, zero dosage.
La Uveja Negra Experimental / Limited Releases
Variable — Castilla-La ManchaEva and Venancio's experimental edge — small-lot cuvées that explore the boundaries of what their family vineyard can express. These may include short-maceration skin-contact whites, single-parcel Cencibel bottlings, or blends that incorporate varieties not typically associated with La Mancha. The common thread is zero additives, artisanal process, and total creative freedom. These wines are not always available. When they are, they are shared with friends, family, and the small but growing community of natural wine enthusiasts who have discovered this garage project in the heart of La Mancha. Zero sulphites, zero filtration, zero fining.
Legacy — The Daughter, the Garage & the Recovery of the Family
La Uveja Negra matters because it is one of the most honest and intimate wine projects in Spain — the work of a daughter who, in 2018, decided that her family's vineyard would not become another casualty of industrial agriculture, and who, four years later, launched a garage bodega with her partner, making zero-additive, organic wine from Airén and Cencibel without sulphites, without filtration, and without pretension. In a region where La Mancha is synonymous with bulk wine and anonymous blends, Eva Imedio and Venancio Castillo have proven that a family garage can produce wines of clarity, freshness, and emotional depth — wines that taste like calcareous soil, like the recovery of a tradition, and like the stubbornness of the black sheep.
Their legacy is agricultural. By farming their family vineyard organically, by hand-harvesting, by refusing chemicals, and by working the land with the same attention their grandparents gave it, Eva and Venancio have created a model for small-scale viticulture in a region that has been almost entirely absorbed by industrial production. The calcareous soils of La Mancha — white, chalky, poor — are not merely the backdrop. They are the protagonist. And the Airén, the most planted and most maligned grape in Spain, is not merely the raw material. It is the voice.
Their legacy is also familial. The project began with Eva's decision to recover the family tradition. It was launched with the encouragement of her family. It is made in the garage of the family home. And it is shared at the family table. "Acompañada y animada por su familia." This is not a corporate venture. It is a family act — a daughter's return, a partner's collaboration, a parent's pride, a child's inheritance. The name La Uveja Negra — the little black grape, the black sheep — is a family joke made serious, a dialect game made philosophy.
And their legacy is philosophical. Eva and Venancio do not claim to be pioneers. They do not claim to be revolutionaries. They claim only to be artisans — makers of wine with minimum intervention, in a garage, with their own hands. "Utilizamos técnicas de cultivo y cosecha cuidadosamente seleccionadas en un proceso completamente artesanal, tanto en la producción como en el embotellado." The sentence is modest. The implication is enormous: in an era of industrial wine, of additives, of consultants, and of global homogenisation, the most radical act is to make wine in your garage, with your family, and to bottle it without sulphites.
From the family vineyard to the family garage, from the recovery of tradition in 2018 to the launch of La Uveja Negra in 2022, from the calcareous soils of La Mancha to the table where the wine is opened and judged, La Uveja Negra is a testament to what happens when a daughter decides that the family vineyard is older than the appellation, that the garage is truer than the château, and that the best way to make wine is with your own hands, your own grapes, and your own name. The black sheep has spoken. The family listens. And the drinker is transformed.