An hour's drive from Barcelona lies the Penedès, where most Spanish sparkling wine comes from. Cava is made like Champagne, with a second fermentation in the bottle, but from different grapes: mainly Xarel·lo, Macabeo and Parellada. Many of the best houses work organically or biodynamically, and some have left the DO Cava to follow stricter rules of their own. Below are the wineries you can visit.
Sant Sadurní d'Anoia
Sant Sadurní is the capital of cava, and many houses have their cellars right in the town. Under Recaredo is the cellar Josep Mata Capellades began building under his house in 1924. All the wines are brut nature, without added sugar, from a single vintage and disgorged by hand. At Juvé & Camps you walk through six floors of tunnels, where the bottles are still turned by hand.
Jaume Giró i Giró, with its yellow façade, and Cava Blancher on the Plaça del Pont Romà are also right in the centre, with cellars on several floors underground. Just outside the town, Celler Kripta makes Kripta, a sparkling wine in an amphora-shaped bottle that ages for around eight years.
Gelida and Subirats
Torelló in Gelida has documents going back to 1395 and 23 generations of winegrowing, with 135 hectares of organic vineyards around two medieval masias. In Subirats, Sumarroca has organic vineyards on a large estate between Sant Sadurní and Monistrol d'Anoia. In Sant Pau d'Ordal, Albet i Noya became Spain's first organic winemaker. After tasting, eat in the same village at Cal Xim, where they have grilled lamb chops over oak for more than fifty years.
The rest of the Penedès
Parés Baltà in Pacs del Penedès has made wine since 1790. The estate is biodynamic, and its own sheep graze the land. Can Ràfols dels Caus in the Garraf massif pioneered fermenting Xarel·lo in chestnut barrels. Caves Bolet in Castellví de la Marca has been organic since 2003, and you can stay in a modernist house from 1911. Heretat Baltà de Cela in Guardiola de Font-rubí makes a sparkling wine from Xarel·lo alone that ages for five years. Jean Leon in Torrelavit was the first winery in Spain to make a wine from Cabernet Sauvignon alone.
Around Barcelona
In Alella, fifteen kilometres north of Barcelona, Alella Vinícola is in a modernist building by a pupil of Gaudí. If you want to head further inland, go to Abadal in the Bages, where the white Picapoll grows.
Tip
Most wineries only receive visitors by appointment. By train from Barcelona you are in Sant Sadurní in an hour, where you can visit several cellars on foot. All addresses are also in the Barcelona & Penedès guide.
