Graciano, sometimes called Graciana is a richly perfumed black grape variety once widely grown in Rioja in northern Spain. It had fallen from favour because of its inconveniently low yields, thereby depriving modern Rioja of an important flavour ingredient with considerable freshness, but by 2011 plantings had grown to almost 2,000 ha/5,000 acres, from which some increasingly interesting varietal bottlings are made in Rioja and Navarra, and there were experimental plantings as far afield as Toledo. This is Portugal’s tinta miúda, France’s Morrastel, and it has also been certified through dna profiling that the Tintilla de Rota grape of Jerez and bovale sardo on Sardinia are both Graciano. The Parraleta of Somontano is also Graciano.
