Wines

With its five-plus years of lees aging and its hand-riddling and manual disgorgement, “Terrers” is a “basic” cuvée that sees more back-of-house time and labor than the overwhelming majority of Champagnes of any echelon. Built on the back of the minerality-enhancing Xarel·lo, fortified with Macabeu and a hint of Parellada, it offers penetrating minerality, with snappy orchard fruits, and citrus blossom all given definition by sizzling acidity. Its extended lees contact is felt in the wine’s palate-commanding breadth and it possesses a precision that shames its peers, all the while remaining irresistibly delicious.

Comprised of Xarel·lo with a nearly equal amount of Macabeu; from the oldest vines situated on the Recaredo estates at Can Romeu (Sant Sadurní d’Anoia), La Pedra Blanca (Subirats) and Can Rosell de la Serra (Torrelavit), all in the “Alt Penedès” region; all the must from the Xarel·lo grapes. The wine is fermented in oak barrels, marked by notes of ripe fruits married to a lively citrus-infused backbone: the height of elegance. Aged a minimum of 7 years on the lees.

This cuvée is a blend of two-thirds Macabeu and one-third Xarel·lo planted between 1950-55. The latter cépage is barrel-fermented in small oak casks to obtain more structure and elegance. The “Particular” is aged for at least eight years prior to its disgorgement. It is a full-bodied, bone dry sparkling wine of exceptional complexity and breed. Only 8,000 bottles or so are produced annually.

This is a very special cuvée sourced from a single vineyard situated in the most elite section of the domaine, slightly less than one hectare planted entirely to the Xarel·lo grape in 1940. The wine is fermented in barrel and rests on the lees for 3-½ months with occasional battonage. The Turo d’En Moto is then aged for at least 120 months before the first disgorgement, as indicated on every bottle.

Recaredo’s uncompromisingly vinous, deeply colored sparkling rosé is produced from fully ripe Monastrell and Garnacha, pressed slowly and given six hours of skin-maceration, and given five years of lees aging. Bright, sappy, and bursting with salt-flecked fruit, this wine simultaneously expresses the verve of the vintage and the solar imprint of the terroir. If most still rosé from the French stretch of the sea straitjackets itself with overcropping, sulfur, and a rush to bottling (that salmon color so beloved by the market requires some coercion), “Intens” expresses the full luscious heat of the Mediterranean in typically Recaredo-esque visceral fashion, yet it remains scintillatingly vibrant and refreshing to drink.

The guiding idea behind this bottling is to spotlight Xarel-lo on its own in a finesse-enhancing terroir. To that end, Subtil is sourced from two Xarel-lo holdings from the Serral del Roure estate, situated at 240 meters altitude: (1) 2 hectares in the vineyard Can Rossell planted in 1989 in double-guyot, with easterly and westerly expositions; and (2) 1 hectare of bush vines in the Caelles vineyard planted in 2012 and exposed northeast and southwest. Soils here are loamy, and characterized by a relatively even balance of sand, silt, and clay, with clay-loam predominating on the lower parts of the slopes and abundant gravel and pebbles on the upper parts. These two sectors of soil together provide both ample drainage and adequate water retention, creating a wine that deftly balances precision and richness.