Wines of Malaga — sweet Moscatel, Ronda reds and the hills

Grapes have been here since the Phoenicians. Romans and later centuries kept the trade. In 1502 the Catholic Monarchs confirmed the rights of Malaga’s vineyard owners. By the eighteenth century the port was sending sweet wine across Europe. In 1791 the Spanish ambassador in Moscow gave cases to Catherine II; she liked them enough to lift the duty on Malaga wine in her lands.

Phylloxera reached Spain through Malaga in the late 1870s and wrecked the old monoculture on the Montes. The sweet name survived. Dry table wine under Sierras de Malaga is the newer chapter, especially around Ronda.

What you will actually be poured:

• Sweet wines — the classic Malaga. Moscatel and Pedro Ximenez, rich, often a dessert or aperitif glass. Some are fortified with grape spirit. This is DO Malaga.
• Wines from sun-dried grapes — the same DO, made from Moscatel or Pedro Ximenez left on mats in the sun until they wrinkle. Very sweet, strong raisin flavour. The dried fruit itself is sold as Pasas de Malaga; the wine is not a separate denomination.
• Dry reds — Sierras de Malaga. Tempranillo, Syrah, Cabernet and others, especially around Ronda.
• Dry whites — also Sierras de Malaga: light table whites from Moscatel, Pedro Ximenez and international grapes. Not the same drink as the sweet historic wine.
• Rosé — less common, same dry denomination, fresh and fruity.

Pasas de Malaga on a packet is the raisin from the Axarquia or Manilva. You eat it. Wine from those raisins goes into a DO Malaga bottle.

Axarquia

East of Malaga, the hills behind Velez-Malaga, Competa, Sayalonga and Frigiliana. This is Moscatel country: steep terraces, raisins laid on the pasero, sweet wine. La Axarquia is the day trip from the eastern Costa. Book a small bodega. The roads are slow.

Montes de Malaga

The hills immediately north of the city. Before phylloxera this was almost all vine. A little remains. Each September the Lagar de Torrijos, in the natural park, puts on a harvest fiesta with the old stomp. It is a park day with a glass, not a street of cellars.

North

Toward Antequera and the inland plain. Hotter summers, a more continental feel. Dry and sweet lots both appear. Antequera is the town stop; the vines are in the surrounding terms.

Manilva

West coast, toward Casares and Estepona. Moscatel again, and raisins under the same Pasas stamp. The vendimia here is a local fair, not a Jerez-scale week.

Serrania de Ronda

The high ground around Ronda. This is where Sierras de Malaga has the most visitor bodegas: dry reds, some white, tastings you can book. The wine museum photograph on this page is that world. Pair it with the gorge, not with a second mountain range the same afternoon.

From the Costa del Sol: Ronda for a dry-wine bodega, or the Axarquia for Moscatel. In Malaga city, Antigua Casa de Guardia on Alameda Principal pours the sweet wine from barrels. A longer note on cellar visits sits in Visit a winery in Malaga.