Priorato Wine Region

from Essential Magazine February 2022

Vino Mio

PRIORATO

HOW TWO LUMINARIES FOUNDED A WINE REGION

No lover of wine will expect a prize for nominating the most wellknown Spanish regions: La Rioja, Ribera del Duero, Jerez, Rías Baíxas, Jumilla, etc. But how many can identify the other 62? It just so happens that the regions which sell the most wine also produce the most, so the system feeds on itself, but aren’t there lesser-known regions that deserve to be recognised more widely?

WORDS ANDREW J LINN PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY OF CLOS MOGADOR

It is very seldom that, anywhere in the winemaking world, an entire wine production area has become established thanks mainly to the efforts of two people. But this is just one of the reasons that the area known as Priorato is so fascinating. Located in the foothills of the Pyrenees, about 60 km from Barcelona, the journey used to take more than three hours over rutted tracks, now fortunately improved by tarmac. It was originally the preserve of religious orders, in this case Carthusian monks in the 12th century. They were prepared to bear freezing winters and sizzling summers in the name of their faith. But these hardy monks always brought vines from wherever they came in order to make communion wine (not for the sustenance of the brothers, of course). Priorato means priory, so the thread is easy to follow. Nevertheless, a more inhospitable location for growing grapes would be hard to envisage. Terraces were manually hacked out of steep mountain sides, and what little soil that existed was hidden under layers of rock. Even today the vineyards are worked almost as they were in the 19th century, using mules and not employing chemicals. There is possibly no other wine region anywhere like this one. Garnacha and Cariñena are the commonest grapes, with minimal amounts of white and rosado varieties. There are few wine regions with such a low grape production per hectare, in this case 2,000 kilos as opposed to the 10,000 kilos for many ‘industrial’ wineries.

In Priorato it is the human story that is more interesting than the wine data. The two movers and shakers who got the whole show on the road were good friends with a vibrant social life. René Barbier’s family had lost all its winemaking assets in Spain because of the Rumasa scandal of the late 1970s. His soul mate and best buddy was – and still is – Alvaro Palacios, born into one of the most respected families of La Rioja, Palacios Remondo. Palacios had studied wine in France at Chateau Pétrus, and logically he could have continued in La Rioja where his future was guaranteed by the security of his family’s domaine. But instead he was drawn to remote and seductive Priorat, which had been one of Spain’s important pre-Phylloxera wine regions. Álvaro believed that the area could be tapped to yield wines of the stature of Pétrus and Grange.

While René Barbier bought the finca L’Hort Piqué with the financial help of his father-inlaw, Alvaro acquired in 1990 Finca Dofi, now referred to as L’Ermita. It took him five years to get it into shape and another 20 for the wine to become acknowledged as one of Spain’s greatest. Understandably at the time the locals thought he was mad, since none of them were doing more than scratching a living from viticulture, and the possibility that great wines could ever be made in the region was a sad joke. There was actually a proposal on the table at the time for all wines made locally to be funnelled through a co-operative and sold under a generic label.

Back then in 1989 there were only four bodegas in Priorato. Today there are more than a hundred, with wellknown names like Josep Lluís Pérez, Carles Pastrana, Torres, Castell de Perelada, Freixenet and Codorniu. Four million bottles of wine are now produced annually

Another visionary who was an early recruit to the commune, as it was known then, was Daphne Glorian. Paris-born and of Swiss nationality, she had met the two ‘locos’ in the USA and been infected by their enthusiasm. She went to Spain and sold her car to purchase a small vineyard. The rest, as they say, is history. Her Clos Erasmus is the first Spanish wine to earn a Robert Parker score of 100 points – two years running. Glorian only makes 3,000 bottles annually. A bottle of the 2019 vintage costs 200 euros, and the 2019 Vintage of L’Ermita is available for around €1.200 a bottle, although lesser wines (see below) can be found at more reasonable prices. e

Wines from the bodegas below are available in all good wine stores and online: Z Alvaro Palacios Z Clos Mogador (René Barbier) Z Mas Doix Z Ferrer Bobet Z Clos Erasmus / Clos i Terrasses (Daphne Glorian) Z Costers de Siurana / Clos de l’Obac Z Mas Martinet Z Clos Figueras Z Clos Dominic Z Scala Dei Z Celler Sabaté Z Josep Grau

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