Some would imagine a really enjoyable experience, others would savour every drop but the reality is that tasting so many wines is hard work for the palate, and you come out with teeth looking like you have been to dinner with Dracula.
True professionals spend more time with their nose pushed deep into the glass than quaffing the wine, and even then it is swirled around the mouth and spat out. Trying to capture what you have seen, smelled and tasted in words is possibly the hardest part and "I like this one" is not acceptable wine terminology.
When the wines you are tasting are all from the same region (Catalonia) and the same grape varieties are present in most of the wines it tends to emphasize the defects present very clearly and the 8 tasters were pretty unanimous on which were the worst wines. Worst in the sense of not technically correct, either through lack of balance, too much wood, lack of acidity or both which in Spanish wines seems to be a constant problem.
At the end of the 3 hour session a few wines emerged in both the under and over 15€ division.
In the under 15€ bracket:
2 wines from Cadaques (Empordà) which is more famous for artists than wines but these are both new wineries and interesting to taste- Pirata and Perafita; from the Montsant l'Alleu and l'Heravi; from Terra Alta Sola d'en Pol and Templari and Sirsell from the Priorat where most wines are more expensive.
In the above 15€ category(some wines went up to 80€):
From the Empordà, Perelada wines were represented with both Finca Malaveina and Finca Garbet; from Montsant a Kosher wine Peraj Ha' abib; from the Priorat the Trio Infernal and Akiles
Undoubtably the most dissapointing showing were for some the expensive wines including Finca Dofi and Vall Llach which just goes to prove that tasting blind means your palate is not biased!
La Gola is where the river Ter flows into the Mediterranean Sea, having started in the Pyrenees mountains around the ski resort of Vallter 2000 some 220 kms away.
The fields on either side of the Ter are very flat, fertile land where cultivation of fruit, wheat, corn and rice takes place. There are also wetlands which although cultivated, are also part of the Aiguamolls Nature Reserve, famous for a wide range of migratory birds.
There are many paths signposted telling you where to go and being flat the area is perfect for cycling and walking.
Of course no exercise is possible if at the end there is not a meal contemplated and in this case the local specialities involve rice and seafood which is one type of “arroz” and in other parts of Spain would be called a “paella“.
A delicacy called “angulas” are found where eels breed in fresh water rivers producing millions of tiny eels which are caught at night in nets and currently retail for 500€ to1,300€ a kilo depending on season, if you can find them.
The small restaurants around La Gola are some of the few places you will be able to taste this amazing dish cooked in olive oil and garlic and hot peppers, once tried never forgotten!
Summer is almost over and yet some people have been busier than ever; my 90 year old friend Lluis is one of them. First he was busy sorting and platting the onions and garlic and now he is working on this years hazelnut harvest, by hand of course.
All of these products come from either his veggie garden or the woods he has near the village of La Pera which is where he has lived all his life. The tomatoes were late but tasty although not particularly abundant and the onions were bigger because of the wet winter/spring we had.
Next will be the beans which are dried and stored for the winter in his cellar along with the potatoes and soon it will be grape harvest and the new wine will go into the casks to keep them jolly through the winter months.
When you ask about the weather he tells you how much colder and wetter it used to be 30 or 40 years back when they had a river at the bottom of the village where they could swim and fish which is now just a dry ditch. There was occasional snow and it froze every night from December to February contrasted to now when even bougainvillea survive in sheltered spots and they die when it gets close to zero.
Like in many agricultural areas the end of summer is celebrated with a harvest festival to give thanks for the bountiful (or not depending on the year) crops and to prepare for the shorter, colder days ahead.
Living in complete harmony with the seasons is amazing, there is always something important to do whose benefit you will not see for several months but on which your life could depend before the arrival of modern logistics to supply shops in even the remotest villages, or transport to reach them.
Sion, Lluis’ wife still gets a thrill when she hears the horn announcing the fishmonger who comes through their village twice a week, she still thinks it a real luxury to eat fresh as opposed to salted fish.
Talking with them makes you realise how much us city dwelling folk take for granted every time we go food shopping!
The first picture is of an old traditional food served in Camprodon called “garru”, boiled ham on the ubiquitous toasted bread with olive oil and tomato rubbed in with optional garlic. A great way to start the day!
Pals is a town set on a hill some 6 kms from the Costa Brava and has been well restored in all its medieval splendour. The steep narrow streets winding up to the church and tower are full of interesting balconies, doors, courtyards with many colourful plants like hibiscus and bougainvillea growing everywhere.
Like all medieval towns the important characteristics are here, the hill and walls for extra fortification, the church and lords house and the tower which was a lookout as well as providing water storage in some cases. Pals was on the coast 500 years ago before the surrounding land silted up and watching for pirates was important as this was a wealthy town from trading agricultural commodities.
Rice from Pals is famous for its quality and flavour and they built an irrigation system to sustain the industry which dates back a thousand years.
Now the town mainly lives off tourism with many art galleries, shops selling local produce (chocolates and rice) and ceramics from the nearby La Bisbal pottery centre. There are many terraces to sit and eat and drink in the shade before admiring the views from the top of the village over the Islas Medes and the MediterraneanSea.
The Priorat is one of the hidden gems of the Spanish wine world and luckily it is much easier to visit now that the access roads have improved and only takes an hour and a half to reach from Barcelona. Why go there? Well the terrain is mountainous, the climate very dry and extreme and the roads narrow and winding but despite all of this the drama of the steep slopes planted with almond trees or vines, villages built on rocky outcrops and above all some spectacular wines are what should bring you here. This is where the traditional varieties of garnacha (white and red) and cariñena are blended with newer arrivals cabernet, syrah and merlot to make some of the most powerful yet complex wines which reflect the wild herbs and red fruit aromas which send wine lovers all over the world into ecstasy. It is fair to say that these wines have a bigger following outside of Spain due to what is referred to locally as "Riojitis" but cost has also been a factor since many of these wines have been overpriced. Reality seems to have set in and there are plenty of very interesting offerings in the 10-25€ range as the number of Bodegas (wineries) has exploded from a dozen to nearly a hundred in only ten years. A day trip visiting two contrasting bodegas with a full lunch in between is a great way to discover this wild area and I know you will fall in love with it just like me! Contact: wine.walks@gmail.com for more details.
Girona only has a population approaching 100,000 and yet this week we have had and will have a truly international flavour with the 10th Religious and World Music Festival and the massive Tour de France cycling race hitting town tomorrow.
The Music Festival has seen performers of real status and has mixed many styles of music both classical and contemporary, from Fauré’s Requiem choirs to the modern beat of Rokia Traoré (Mali) and Khaled (Algeria) both wonderful performers supported by excellent musicians.
During the festival there is also a temporary (shame!) food court set up with many cuisines from all over the world where you can eat either before or after the concerts and is right next to the cathedral steps and cloisters venues.
The setting for some of the concerts is the other part which makes this festival stand out-where else can you sit outside on a balmy night on the steps of a cathedral listening to top class acts while taking in the beautiful buildings around the Old Town? Not very many, let me tell you so get down to Girona quick!
On second thoughts with the Tour starting in Girona and finishing in Barcelona tomorrow will bring enough chaos to our small town, so just watch it on TV instead and come visit when there are fewer people around!
Sitges, now famous as the gay capital of Europe, has always been a place the good folk of Barcelona escaped to for fun and frolics. The 40 km distance is an easy drive or train ride and when you arrive you feel this is a place where most things go set in a beautiful setting with beaches and a crystal blue sea in touching distance.
The “pink” crowd have made sure that eating choices are both plentiful, varied and good with lots of funky terraces and passageways worth exploring, gastronomically speaking. The narrow streets of the old town offer lots of interesting architecture and are also noteworthy for the ceramic street name plaques and the colourful balconies festooned with flowerpots and plants. There are plenty of boutiques for those seeking a bit of shopping therapy but there are also some interesting museums for those seeking more classic culture. The annual film festival specialising in the horror genre is very popular and attracts many people from all over the world.
All in all Sitges is well worth a stop to explore, only the most jaded will pass by unimpressed, and they possibly should stay longer anyway!
Olives and olive oil is what brought the Greeks and Romans to the Iberian peninsula some 3,500 yrs ago and it has been a crucial commodity ever since. The south of Spain produces the quantity with thousands of hectares cultivated in the poorest soils where nothing else will survive the extreme weather, but around Lleida in the western part of Catalonia there are also extensive plantations.
The main variety is the arbequina olive which although small in size has one of the lowest levels of acidity and some even go as far as to say it produces “sweet” olive oil in contrast to the more “picante” southern varieties.
Outside the town of Les Borges Blanques, some 35kms from Lleida, just off the main road, is a museum/theme park devoted to explaining the cultivation, processing and selling of olive oil through history.
Outside the gardens are full of huge gnarled olive trees that date back to when the Romans were in the area some 2,000 yrs ago. One amazing tree is said to have been carbon dated as 2,700 yrs old!
The process of extraction got increasingly sophisticated as the presses on display show until today it is a high tech enterprise where the temperature is controlled and the quality has improved beyond belief with the resulting oil giving an organoleptic experience like a good wine.
Now there are hundreds of different oils on the market, some from olives picked early making the oil a green colour to blends of different varieties or organically produced, whichever way with some bread to drizzle on it is still one of the best Mediterranean customs!
As part of the wine festival there are also olive oil tastings and cooking demonstrations throughout the weekend. This one was held in the main square of Falset and everyone had the same accessories of either a butane camping gas stove or a small charcoal grill on which to prepare their dishes.
All the important ingredients of the area were being shown off in spectacular and imaginative style from wild herbs, pine nuts and almonds, olives and olive oil, wine, vinegar to season wild boar, hare, rabbit and some juicy pork products.
What cannot be passed on through the pictures is the amazing smells and of course the taste, next year you will have to come to sample for yourselves!
See and download the full gallery on posterous
Pals is a town set on a hill some 6 kms from the Costa Brava and has been well restored in all its medieval splendour. The steep narrow streets winding up to the church and tower are full of interesting balconies, doors, courtyards with many colourful plants like hibiscus and bougainvillea growing everywhere.
See and download the full gallery on posterous
See and download the full gallery on posterous
See and download the full gallery on posterous
Sitges, now famous as the gay capital of Europe, has always been a place the good folk of Barcelona escaped to for fun and frolics. The 40 km distance is an easy drive or train ride and when you arrive you feel this is a place where most things go set in a beautiful setting with beaches and a crystal blue sea in touching distance.
See and download the full gallery on posterous
See and download the full gallery on posterous
See and download the full gallery on posterous