2021 Terroir Sense Fronteres Montsant "Marcenca", Catalonia, Spain
ABOUT THIS WINE
100% Grenache. 50 year old vines in red clay with gypsum layers. 800 meters elevation.
Terroir sense Fronteres began as a quest to harness the unique minerality and soul of Montsant, giving liquid voice to the restraint and freshness of the complex hills. 2021 vintage marks the debut of another voice in this growing symphony: Marcenca. Although our Guix Vermell also uses fruit from this 800-meter-high vineyard, the plentiful gypsum in the clay soils here create a stonier, stormier and singular expression.
The Garnacha vines average about 50-years of age and tend toward vigorous growth in the special microclimate of the site. The wine is whole bunch fermented for 6 - 8 days in cement tanks, then left to age for 6 months in cement. Using a lighter extraction than many wines in our portfolio, the limited release Marcenca is a pale, radiant beauty that sings a song all its own.
The complex aromas are as stormy and stony as the site itself. Wild cherry, blueberry, beach plum, and kumquat infused with a deep, abiding spice. Dark red fruit and elegant florality. The taut palate courses with mineral momentum and a chalky finesse. Balsamic notes and evergreen tension linger into a long, spicy finish. The power comes from deliberate restraint, from gentle infusion, creating an articulation unafraid of the light and the introspection that brings.
ABOUT THIS PRODUCER
When Eben Sadie and Dominik Huber first met in 2001 at Mas Martinet, Eben was a promising and highly-regarded young enologist from South Africa and Dominik, German by birth, was a wine enthusiast with a background in business administration and an interest in the culinary arts. In short order they became fast friends.
With the help of the Pérez family of Mas Martinet, Eben and Dominik purchased some fruit and leased a little corner in the cellar of Cims de Porrera where they vinified their first vintage of Dits del Terra in 2001. After two years at Cims de Porrera they moved into a tiny cellar in Torroja del Priorat. The move coincided with the first vintage of Arbossar in 2003. In the following years they released additional cuvées: Torroja in 2005, Manyes and Tosses in 2006, Pedra de Guix in 2008 and Terra de Cuques in 2011. Throughout the decade since its founding, Terroir al Limit has evolved in its understanding of the Priorat – coming to view it as a region similar to Burgundy in its complexity and potential to produce elegant and transparent wines. The Torroja and Terra de Cuques are the village wines, Pedra de Guix, Dits del Terra and Arbossar the Premier Crus, and Manyes and Tosses are the Grand Crus.
With the demands arising from increased production and additional farming responsibilities and with Eben Sadie spending more time in South Africa with his various projects, Domink began working full time at Terroir al Limit in 2007. Devoting himself primarily to the cultivation of a growing number of vineyard sites, Dominik approach to farming directly impacted the quality of the fruit at harvest. With better fruit coming into the cellar, Eben and Dominik had a profound realization that ripe, concentrated grapes combined with extractive winemaking and aging in barriques didn’t really show the authenticity
of the vineyards they were working. As a result they begun a process of reevaluation of their work – resulting in earlier harvests, phasing out the use 225 liter barrels and employing a “Burgundian” style of vinification utilizing whole clusters and avoiding either pigeage or remontage. The goal at Terroir al Limit is the fostering of wines of infusion rather than extraction, and elegance rather than the typical heaviness of the Priorat. Currently the wines are primarily aged in foudres– Stockinger upright barrels from Austria to be exact– between 1,200 and 3,500 liters in size or in small concrete tanks.
Realizing that organic or biodynamic farming during an era of global warming is insufficient for a region as hot and dry as the Priorat, Dominik farms rigorously to guarantee the health and vitality of his soils so they can retain as much moisture as possible, reducing the hydric stress on the vines in summer and allowing for an earlier harvest of physiologically ripe fruit.
Eben Sadie left Terroir al Limit in 2011, to devout his energies to his extraordinary work in South Africa, but he left it in the capable hands of Dominik Huber. Each successive vintage is testament to their original vision for Terroir al Limit as well as Dominik’s continued quest to make the most elegant and expressive wines in the Priorat.