Together with winemaker Marcel Sabate we have reason to celebrate CastellRoig’s Terroja site’s inclusion in a new top cava designation called Cava de Paraje.
Read the full Decanter article here: First Cava ‘grand cru’ sites are chosen
Highlights:
The saying is that ‘good comes to those who wait’, and Cava producers and fans have had to be patient for official sign-off on the new premium classification, the Cava de Paraje Calificado.
Last week, Spain’s ministry of agriculture announced the first 12 sites to form part of the new classification at the top of the Spanish sparkling wine‘s hierarchy.
Spain’s government has approved 12 Cava grape growing sites to sit above all others in a new top-level classification designed to promote single-vineyard wines.
In all wines,” points out Pedro Bonet Ferrer, President of the Consejo Regulador for Cava, “there is a premium category. It’s necessary for the image, and for the logic of quality, too. The quality pyramid must have a top.” The Cava pyramid does indeed have a top, but it is shrouded in mist.
The first step in rectifying this is to create a framework by which excellence can be articulated. In June this year, the Cava authorities finally presented a scheme intended to do that.
It’s called Cava de Paraje. Paraje is generally translated as ‘site’ or ‘place’, though it can also mean something a little larger; ‘landscape’, for example. “Some people are trying to say it is ‘single estate’,” says Pedro Bonet, “but it’s really a single vineyard, a specific small place, an original piece of land.” The other terms which were considered but rejected included heredad (estate), finca (farm), parcela(parcel) and pago (vineyard – the most logical alternative, but already trademarked by Marqués de Griñón).
