2019 Terroir Al Límit Priorat "Les Tosses", Catalonia, Spain

ABOUT THIS WINE

100% Carignan. 90 year old vines in black slate soils. 600 meters elevation. 3,200 bottles produced.

Nothing ever compares with your first love. Especially when that love began through fate, a stolen glimpse through the trees. Might it have been destiny that steered Dominik Huber and his motorbike through the twisting and mountainous dirt roads to the tiny, 2-ha Les Tosses plot. At 600 meters of elevation, this grand cru vineyard is not only the highest in the Torroja del Priorat village, but also the first (2003) in the Terroir al Límit collection. It is the Matterhorn of winemaking, a challenge that must be attempted simply because it is there: 90-year-old Carignan vines, steep black slate slopes, blazing southwestern exposition. It was also love at first sight. Inspired by a cellar approach from the far-flung cool and fog-laden Burgundy hills, this wine is hand harvested, with whole cluster native fermentation, and then aged for 8 months in cement tanks.

Like the dusty, sun baked hills of Torroja in which it grows, there is a rugged, raw power to this wine. Opulent black fruits and rich aromas of smoke and spice swirl in the nearly black depths of the glass. Despite the initial hint of brawn, a serious, thoughtful character emerges with a bright, taut acidity and incredible momentum. Each sip becomes a mesmerizing whirlwind of the delicious power and energy, intensity and beauty that accompany any true infatuation.

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.