CATALAN GRAPE & GRAIN
TUESDAY OCTOBER 22, 2024
cava / BODEGA MASCARÓ
Cava is a Spanish sparkling wine made in the same way as Champagne, only with a different variety grape. Mascaró, a multi-generational family company, has produced cava, wine, liquor, brandy, and vermouth in Vilafranca since the 1940s. Dedicated to the belief that the essence of a product is in its origin, the company sources grapes for all of its wines and cavas from self-owned local vineyards, allowing full control of the entire production process and guaranteeing the highest quality of the final product. Mascaró offers a fascinating tour of its ancient underground cellars.
VILAFRANCA
Founded in the 12th century, ‘Vilafranca del Penedès’ boasts a 13th century palace as well as a number of historical churches and townhouses. But it’s best known as a center of wine production, being the only sizeable town in the Penedès, a rural region recognized internationally as the home of Catalan sparkling wine, or cava. Many of the town’s buildings are or have been owned by local wineries, and there is unsurprisingly a thriving wine tourism industry here.
Catalan Craft
Barcelona has been at the very forefront of the Spanish craft beer scene from day one. British expat Steve Huxley is widely credited with being the pivotal figure in the early days, opening the country’s first craft brewery, Barcelona Brewing, back in 1993. Meanwhile a small but extremely dedicated group of local followers began dipping their feet into the water, traveling overseas to learn from new craft brewers and old masters alike, particularly in Germany and England.
The earliest Catalan brewers thus focused on traditional ales and lagers, and these styles were the focus at early editions of the pioneering Mediona Festival outside of Barcelona. Mediona’s legendary founder Carlos Rodriguez in turn inspired countless local beer fans to take up brewing, and dozens of those disciples now run small but successful breweries of their own, in Barcelona itself and in neighboring cities and villages.
In the past ten years the scene in cosmopolitan Barcelona itself has expanded so quickly that the city now has to be considered a major beer destination, and the well-attended international festival MASH attracts rock star brewers from all over Europe as well as the US. Craft beer still accounts for a very small proportion of beer sales in Barcelona but the numbers have risen dramatically over the past five years as the movement gains more mainstream popularity.
masia agullons
At the turn of the millennium, beer enthusiast Carlos Rodriguez began experimenting with homebrewing in his centuries-old farmhouse outside Mediona, a small town set in the wild countryside west of Barcelona. Carlos’ tinkering soon became a passion, and around the same time he founded Spain’s first, all-amateur “Mediona” craft beer festival in his hometown, he also went officially professional as a brewer, launching Masia Agullons in 2009. Both ventures had massive influences on the still-youthful local beer scene, and within a couple years, there was a tidal wave of new commercial and amateur brewers starting up in Catalonia and elsewhere in Spain, virtually all inspired directly and personally by the “Godfather of Catalan Craft Beer.”
Today Carlos oversees an ever-expanding, fully-professional Mediona festival and continues to perfect his small range of excellent pale ales and aged sours at his own funky farmhouse brewery, which is the very definition of “artisanal.” Carlos is recognized by many of the world’s top brewers as a key figure on the international beer scene, but he remains essentially Catalan, welcoming visitors to his 11th century farmhouse with its own makeshift English-style pub (which includes a handpump).
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