A touch of Languedoc and let's go to Mallorca!
Year 13, No. 03
Greetings,
I won't lie, it's been a warm winter.
I mean, not a heavier-hoodie kind of San Francisco winter, but a winter where I haven't cursed existence, needing to put on four layers just to take out the trash. If one is to squint their eyes when the sun beams in during midday, it can almost feel like early November sometimes. Almost.
This strange warmth has also allowed for a strange condition of there really being no "off season" for tourism in Europe which I saw firsthand when in Mallorca this past week.
Thankfully, the warmth has also favored the Ukrainians (*) who have had to weather a great deal of this winter with no heating and poor conditions, although winemakers in the south tell me that it portends a good harvest.
If you want to support the Ukrainians and are in Barcelona, you pick up the very last bottles of "Tocat per l'Est" at La Vinícola in Eixample. This is my Grenache wine from 2019 made with grapes from Porrera, Priorat. I'm not collecting a cent from the sales so that everything can go to an organization founded by winery and brewery owners that are providing direct aid in the country.
Additionally, if in Catalunya and interested in tasting all the wines from this experimental Quel Celler project of mine, I'm leading a tasting in English at the Wine Aspects school in Vilafranca del Penedès this Friday. We'll be tasting through everything that I've done to date, even the as-of-yet unreleased 2022 wine as well as several past vintages that sold out long ago.
If looking for a splash of sun in the middle of winter, I'd recommend reading up on Malvasija Dubrovačka, one of the many Malvasia-y wines out there but this one is from the southern tip of Croatia and you can truly taste the sun in every wine.
Maybe it's time that we finally understand why there's a Maturana Buena and a Maturana Mala in Rioja. It may be a small-production variety when taken against the behemoth that is Tempranillo, but there are now a number of unique wines being made from it and the idea that it's Trousseau from Jura in France has proven to be quite wrong.
Or could it be the case that you're simply getting ready for spring to arrive and are looking for some culinary destinations? In that case, may I suggest the latest Food Through Wine write up in the gorgeous region of Terra Alta.
FEATURED REPORTS
Your March is going to start off with a bang as we're looking at two new tasting reports in this newsletter.
The first is from Terrasses du Larzac up in the Languedoc region of France. While "new" in terms of French appellations (it only came to be in 2014), they've been doing some stellar work there in the hills above Montpellier. These are wines very much having a look at if you don't know them or would like to know them more.
Then, we head out into the warm waters of the Mediterranean to take a long-overdue look at the wines on the island of Mallorca. Spain's biggest island has a lot to offer in terms of a beach destination, but the producers are making some great wines with ever-greater focus on the native varieties they have. Toss in the fact that most of these wines are only available on the island itself and perhaps you have a new enotourism destination on your radar?
IN THE NEWS
It's the time of the year!
Yes, yes, turn up the heating, but only so that you can better concentrate on statistic summaries, such as what's happening in Spain (*)
AND NOW THIS
If there's a wine that's always a treat, it's Château Musar from Lebanon and I'm always thrilled when I come across a bottle.
Celebrations just aren't the same without some new Cavas nor perhaps a bit of tasty ancestrale, both showing different side of the Penedès region in Catalunya. Of course who can go wrong when it comes to the classic of Champagne?
If curious, much of this is part of the new Tasting Bench section (*) on the site that allows for quick reviews of wines that might otherwise be lost to the vast tasting database.
Drink well, be well.
-Miquel
(*) articles are free to read