House & Garden Tour
By Jennifer Hamilton
February 20, 2009 San Miguel de Allende

Sculpted sun and moon, water cascading down stone steps 

House & Garden Tour
Sun, Feb 22, tour departs at noon
Biblioteca Pública
Insurgentes 25
US$15 or 150 pesos
Breakfast at Café Santa Ana starts at 9am

1. This glorious property was purchased in 1989, and is still a work in progress even today! Once a hacienda, it may also have been connected to Santuario de Atotonilco across the street, possibly housing its founder, Father Luis Felipe Neri de Alfaro.

The front adobe walls, door and rooms facing the Santuario are all original, dating back to the 1750s. Parts of the inside also were kept intact. Sculptural representations of the sun and moon are on opposing walls. Everything was built by the owners. The modern kitchen is a gourmet’s dream with a huge stove, polished cement countertops and island, and a large collection of folk figures which were purchased at Bellas Artes in Mexico City. The living room is also part of the original building with its eighteenth-century doors and cement door frames. The only new additions in the bedroom are the floor and fireplace, with a clay sculpture fronting the red wall. Many fine pieces of art were created mainly by one of the owners, but also represent other highly respec
ted San Miguel artists. The garden is on two levels, with the lower part filled with plants, herbs and trees surrounding the pool and lush lawn. By the reflecting pool at the far end, the owners built a tea house with gold-leafed nichos and Chinese lanterns in the windows. Across from the kitchen and dining room is another small patio-garden containing a pond filled with water lilies, bamboo and goldfish. Large stones form a circle around old bathtub sunk into the ground. Behind it is a Swedish steam bath and spa.

2. A contemporary colonial adobe home in the style of Roberto Burillo lies above Los Balcones among the hillsides on the edge of the botanical gardens.

 Entering through an ancient wood door, one is greeted on one side by water cascading down stone steps into a large pool and on the other, a garden and a rounded stone wall. Through a high barrel-vaulted entry, adoquín steps rise to the second level. A glass door opens onto a bridge which spans the flooded patio, taking one into the guest wing or the living and dining rooms. Everything is surprise and discovery, with arches everywhere spilling light and shadows. The library contains an old movie projector and ottomans topped with handmade trays. Sounds of fountains or streams can be heard or seen from almost every room. The tranquil master bedroom has expansive vistas and two patios afford views of the gardens, the botanical garden and the town below. The garden is unsurpassed—an elongated pool, again with waterfalls, a stone bridge, and Jacuzzi and pond at its 
far end crosses into the oval grassed area, surrounded by native plants, herbs, masses of lavender, flowering vines and a palapa beside a pond at its far end. A stone wall with open arches overlooks the surrounding hillsides and 360° views are visible from the rooftop accessed through a vine-covered trellis.



Food & Wine

Mexico by the Glass
By Dick Avery February 20, 2009 San Miguel de Allende

Bodegas de Santo Tomás and Viña de Liceaga

The Santo Tomás Valle in Baja California Norte was discovered by Europeans in 1769, by Fray Junípero Serra (yep, that famous Dominican who founded most of the missions up and down the Mexico and California coasts). He promptly named it the Valle San Francisco Solano.

Things stayed pretty quiet until the Dominican order took over the colonization of all of Baja California Norte under the leadership of Father José Loriente. Fr. Loriente set up shop in a mission in 1791, and being the good scholastic that he was, named the winery Santo Tomás de Aquino in honor of the great philosopher of the Middle Ages. 

Fr. Loriente immediately got things humming by planting two thousand Mission grapevines (a grape varietal that today is cultivated primarily for table grapes—sooo, next time you buy some table grapes at your favorite food mart, thank ol’ Fr. Loriente).

Fast forward to the sixties. After changing hands several times, Elias Pando assumed control of the winery. Elias, a serious wine lover and collector, rolled up his sleeves and began to expand the company. He led off by bringing in Dimitri Tchelitcheff, son of the famous André Tchelitcheff, who had revolutionized the California wine industry (see Atención article, 5/16/08 issue, p. 53). Dimitri Tchelitcheff wasted no time in introducing a massive modernization program, buying stainless steel fermentation tanks and small-capacity oak barrels for aging the wines.

In the eighties, Hugo Acosta, the André Tchelitcheff of Baja California wines, changed the direction of the winery to the small-production, high-quality operation it is today, producing 19,000 cases annually of award-winning Merlot, Cabernet and Tempranillo, to name a few. All grapes are from their own vineyards.

In the never-ending quest for the good juice, your intrepid reporter has tasted most of their middle-price-range offerings. He found the reds to be quite good, especially the Cab, Merlot and Tempranillo ones, offering up intense, rich, flavorful, high-extract lip-smackers. An Italian red varietal you don’t see very often, Barbera, is exceptional. 

Their blancos, Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay and Viognier, are delicious when drunk young. An outstanding portfolio!

Bodegas de Santo Tomás celebrates its reputation as the “oldest continuously producing winery in Mexico.” Its goal is to “have Santo Tomás wine on every table in Mexico.” They are well on their way!

Meandering along the Ruta del Vino takes one through some beautiful countryside of eucalyptus trees and olive groves with low hills strewn with boulders, some the size of automobiles. Here, tucked into a pretty grove of eucalyptus, is Viña de Liceaga.

Eduardo Liceaga was totally unaware that, in the early seventies, he would purchase a world-renowned winery. He was busy as a professional engineer for a construction company in Tijuana, totally engrossed in a number of building projects. But, like many professionals, he thought he could do better on his own, so in the late seventies, started his own company. He had grown up on his grandfather’s ranch; in the early eighties he bought 50 acres in the Valle so his children could have the same country lifestyle he had enjoyed.

Having tagged along with his grandfathers when they purchased wine, he grew up with an appreciation of the good juice and he began to consider the possibility of producing wine.

Jumping in with both feet, he initially planted 10,000 table-grape vines, the product of which he sold all over Mexico. Soon, however, he began to make grafts to convert to wine-grape vines. The first harvest yielded a rip-roaring 120 cases, mostly consumed by family and friends. But as he thought the wine wasn’t too shabby, encouraged, he purchased his own vinification equipment and cranked production up to about 3,000 cases a year, where it is today, with most of the grapes outsourced. 

Viña de Liceaga produces a fairly broad array of wine offerings. Most reds are blends such as the Castillo de Las Minas, a 60/40 Merlot/Grenache or the Viña de Liceaga, a 90/10 Merlot/Cabernet Franc tooth-stainer that spends two years in American oak before release.

They’re most proud of their Merlot de Viña Liceaga, a gold medal winner in the 2002 San Francisco Wine Competition that also received “Best of Nation” mention. The whites, I found, were pleasant and tasty, but not remarkable. But, this is primarily red wine country, right?

The visit to this up-and-coming winery and its friendly staff, unfortunately, had to end on a sad note. Eduardo passed away recently and the reins are now in the capable hands of his widow.

Demonstrating wonderful collegiality, several of the other wineries in the Valle have jumped in to help her continue Eduardo’s mission of producing the best wine in the Baja! It’s a good bet she’ll succeed! 

Dick Avery is a freelance writer and head sipper at VinoClubSMA, a wine club devoted to the enjoyment of boutique Mexican wines through tastings. He can be reached at vinoclubsma (at) gmail.com or visit the website at www.vinoclubsma.com.