Catalonia

Catalonia is the north-eastern corner of Spain, between the Pyrenees and the Mediterranean, with Barcelona as its capital and its own language, Catalan, official alongside Spanish. The food experiences in this guide are tapas and wine tours in Barcelona’s old town.

Catalonia’s wine country near Barcelona

Cava, first bottled in 1872

The Penedès, west of Barcelona, with its capital at Vilafranca del Penedès, is the home of cava, the sparkling wine of the traditional method: a second fermentation in the bottle, then at least nine months on the lees. Its regulator dates the first bottle to 1872, when Josep Raventós applied that method to three Penedès grapes in Sant Sadurní d’Anoia.

• The grapes: Macabeo, Xarel·lo and Parellada.
• The cellars: those of Codorníu, Raventós’ house, were declared a National Historic-Artistic Monument in 1976, as a key work of Catalan modernisme by Puig i Cadafalch.

Priorat, a priory in the name

Inland from Tarragona, the Priorat makes powerful red wines from slate soils.

• Rank: one of only two Spanish wine regions with the top DOCa classification (DOQ in Catalan), alongside Rioja.
• Soil: llicorella, a black slate and quartz, under Garnacha and Cariñena, the two key red grapes.
• The Carthusian monastery of Scala Dei, founded in 1194, brought the vine. Its prior ruled seven villages, which gave the region its name.

The calçotada

• When: late winter and spring, when Catalans gather for the calçotada.
• What: calçots, long sweet onions, grilled over a fire.
• With: romesco, a sauce of peppers, nuts and garlic.
• Where it began: Valls, the town where the calçotada was invented according to the Catalan heritage inventory, holds its great Calçotada Festival on the last Sunday of January.