Hello Everyone!!!!
Please join us on Friday, October 7th at 7pm as we welcome the legend, The Godfather, and one of the founding fathers of the Priorat region in Spain, Christopher Cannan, and taste the remarkable wines from CLOS FIGUERAS.
Priorat being close to the ancient Roman capital of the Iberian Peninsula, Tarraco, (Tarragona of today), it is no surprise that vineyards have existed in the region for more than 2000 years. It is believed that many of the surviving terraces were initially built by the Romans.
During the middle ages the entire region was dominated by the Carthusian monks at the monastery of Scala Dei, the prior of Scala Dei exercised his authority over 7 villages, hence the name Priorat. The monks controlled the local economy and all cultivations. Apart from the vine this included olive trees, almonds and hazel nuts. Not much else can grow in the poor schistous soils of this Mediterranean enclave.
Today the region enjoys the coveted “Denominacion de Origen Calificada” appellation which in Spain is only shared with the Rioja.
Christopher Cannan, with his export orientated wine shipping company, Europvin, based in Bordeaux, had already discovered the potential of the Priorat back in 1983 when he was given a bottle of the 1974 vintage Priorat from the Scala Dei winery by a small retailer in San Fransisco. Tasting the wine that same evening with a Californian wine maker, it turned out to be excellent and extraordinarily good value at $4.00 a bottle!
Shortly after Christopher met Manuel Peyra, owner of Scala Dei, and started exporting these delicious wines to various countries including the U.S.A. and Japan. At the time Scala Dei was the only single privately owned estate exporting the wines of Priorat.
Later in 1988 Christopher met Alvaro Palacios at the New York Wine Experience. Alvaro informed Christopher of his plans and invited him to dinner in Logroño where he enthusiastically explained the project to produce world class wines from old vineyards in the Priorat. He proposed to introduce Christopher to René Barbier at Clos Mogador. A few weeks later René turned up in Bordeaux in his old Peugeot and a few samples of his Clos Mogador. At first Christopher was sceptical.
The wine was excellent but the price was high for an unknown product. Nevertheless a couple of years later Christopher decided to show the wine to Robert Parker at one of his regular tastings in Europvin’s Bordeaux office. Parker did not wait to write an article to show his enthusiasm but it was after he published his subsequent issue of “The Wine Advocate”, with exceptionally high scores, that the trade finally took notice of what was happening in this remote corner of Catalonia. Since then Europvin has been exporting Clos Mogador and other Priorat wines to numerous countries in North America and Asia. The Priorat has not looked back. Today over 2000 hectares are in production and 96 bodegas are shipping their wines all over the world.
