60% Xarel.lo, 20% Macabeo, 5% Parellada, 15% Sumoll
Biodynamic, traditional method. All estate fruit. This is the flagship sparkling wine, always soft and delicate, but with good pithy grip and a salty finish. A bit of a Platonic ideal for traditional method sparkling in the Penedès. Fruit is always hand-harvested. Direct press, fermentation and resting in stainless steel. 32 months on lees in bottle, disgorged June ’21.
Mas Candí is Ramon Jané, Mercè Cuscó, Toni Carbó, and Ana Serra — a group of growers deeply respected throughout their home region. They are some of the first to break with tradition in the Penedès, where nearly all farmers must sell their fruit to massive Cava houses just to survive.
In 2006, they began to shift to natural farming; now in their old-vine vineyards inherited from their families, chemical inputs have been eliminated; emphasis is on gentle, manual handling of fruit throughout the process; and the goal is taking the sparkling wines of the Penedès to a higher-quality, personal place, as well as producing both serious and more playful still wines from local, nearly-forgotten varieties.
Up until now, there has been little precedent for wines like these in the Penedès; Mas Candí is at the forefront of a changing scene in the region for still and sparkling wines of global quality.
