Pedro Ximénez

Ped-row-Hee-men-neth

Pedro Ximénez or PX for short is both the name of a white grape variety and the wine from which it’s made. Very occasionally it appears as a dry stony white (usually from Chile), but 95% of the wines you come across will be super-sweet and luscious, for sipping slowly, not glugging!

Yes, PX is simply the short, easy way of pronouncing the grape or wine Pedro Ximénez.

Most Pedro Ximénez is grown in southern Spain, in the Andalusia region, in particular in Montila-Moriles, where it makes up 70% of the vineyards. The climate and soils there suit it to a tee – a high chalk content, little rain, hot days and a big drop in temperature at night.

This is slightly different to Jerez – the heart of sherry production – just southwest of Montila-Moriles. In Jerez, this thin-skinned variety is more prone to botrytis and mildew and so Jerez producers prefer to source their PX from their neighbour. Elsewhere in Spain, PX is also grown but in very small amounts – in Extremadura, Valencia, Castilla La Mancha and Catalunya.

In 1832, it was introduced to Australian vineyards where it is simply known as Pedro, but the total number of hectares there has shrunk to around 100. The grapes go towards making their very sweet wines.

In Portugal, a little is grown under the name Perrum and it pops up in Chile too, where most is made into the classic spirit, pisco, with a little from the Elqui Valley, made into a dry white.

Pedro Ximénez is known for having a high sugar content and low acidity. Its thin skins make it vulnerable in some climates to disease, but the upside is that it’s also very good for drying. The grapes are left on the vine to turn super ripe, then the bunches are left to dry on mats in the sun. This process is called asoleo. Once dried, their sugar content is exceptional – 300-500 grams of sugar per litre. But that’s what makes its wines so delicious!   

Pedro Ximénez wine tends to be a dark mahogany, very viscous, with ‘legs’ that very slowly descend the glass. It gives aromas of toffee, caramel, molasses, dried figs, dates and raisins. Really weighty on the palate, it’s dark and chocolaty, dried fruits again, molasses and very long. With age, these flavours may develop into spice, liquorice and coffee notes and with decades of age, and some sherry houses specialise in this, the fortified wine takes on more savoury notes of herbs, tar and smoke. Always intriguing.  

On the few occasions you come across PX as a dry white, the wines tend to be stony, citrusy and crisp.

If your bottle of Pedro Ximénez is one of the few dry white wines available, then chill it down in the fridge for an hour or two. More likely it’ll be a deliciously sweet, dark and viscous sherry. With its big bold flavours of dried figs and molasses, it can easily be served chilled or cool, but it’ll be equally delicious at room temperature. As it’s so gorgeously sweet, don’t pour too big a portion. Tulip-shaped glasses are the best, so the wine can be gently swirled, and its luscious aromas appreciated.

In its most common guise, as a gorgeously sweet, fortified wine, PX makes the ideal dessert wine. It’s a pudding in itself. It’s also just the ticket for full-on Christmas pudding, sweet enough for a luscious treacle tart and perfect with dark chocolate – a rich chocolate tart, steamed chocolate sponge or dark truffle-style cake. And best of all perhaps, it’s just the liquid to pour over top-quality vanilla ice-cream to make a sensational, no-effort pud!

For more ideas, view our wide range of dessert wines.       

As a dry white – rare – it’ll make stony, citrusy-fresh accompaniment to simple seafood and salads – perhaps puy lentil salad with spiced roasted carrots and feta.

Pedro Ximénez is largely grown in Montila-Morilles. The grapes are left on the vine to become very ripe, then dried and the high-sugar juice squeezed out of the raisin-like grapes. This juice (or must) is fermented – tricky with such a high sugar content in fact – with the fermentation stopped at a chosen point by the addition of spirit.   

Unusually, the base wine of PX is permitted to cross appellation borders into neighbouring Jerez and be called sherry, as long as the wine has been aged for at least two years within a Jerez bodega. The reason for the permission to cross borders is because this variety doesn’t grow or dry well in Jerez due to the region’s humidity, so the grapes are more vulnerable to disease.

Barrels previously used to age Pedro Ximénez wines are highly sought after by whisky distilleries for ageing their spirits. These casks lend a delicious sweetness and richness to the prized liquid.