Cheste
Valencia/València · Valencian Community
DO Valencia8.951inhabitants
1244first mention
1918wine documented
A municipality in the Hoya de Buñol (Valencia), within the DO Valencia, known for its Moscatel and for the Ricardo Tormo circuit. Its permanent settlement was a Muslim farmstead (alquería) beside the river Poyo; after the conquest James I granted the place away, and after the expulsion of the Moriscos it was resettled.
First mention: According to the Llibre del Repartiment, James I granted Xest (Cheste) in 1244; from 1251 Ximén Pérez d'Arenós is recorded as its lord.
The legend
wine boom after French phylloxera (late 19th century); cooperative 1918; Vendimia festivities with the Pisá de Uva (40th edition in 2013)The Pisá de Uva and the cooperative bodega of 1918
Cheste has lived off the vine since ancient times, and its great moment came at the end of the 19th century, when phylloxera devastated the French vineyards and France bought Valencian wine by the bucketful: the stately houses in the centre of town are a legacy of that boom. Once the crisis had passed, in 1918 a handful of growers without bodegas of their own joined together to make their wine in common. So was born Cheste Agraria, one of the first cooperative bodegas in the Valencian region, whose iron-trussed building still displays its founding year in glazed tiles. Devotion, too, passes through the grape: every 9 October, during the Vendimia festivities in honour of Saint Luke, the festival queens pour bunches of grapes into a wooden vat and the barefoot treaders draw the first must of the year to offer it to the saint in thanks for the harvest.
Alive today: Cheste belongs to the DO Valencia. Its main festivities in October, dedicated to Saint Luke, are known as the Fiestas de la Vendimia and include the election of the Queen, the floral offering and the Pisá de Uva on 9 October. Cheste Agraria, the cooperative founded in 1918, still makes wine and offers visits to its bodega.
Wineries and their wines
- Reymos Selección
- Torre de la Pobleta Blanco Dulce
- Viajero Mistela
- Viña Cecilia Blanco
- Viña Tendida Rosado
- Reymos Espumoso
- Viña Tendida Blanco
- Viña Tendida Pink Moscato
- Viña Tendida Rosado
- Corinto Rojo
- Dolce Vita Moscatel
- Royuel Mistela Blanca
- Royuel Moscatel Blanco
- Royuel Moscatel Dorado
Wine towns nearby