The bling-bling of Mas Candi
It’s not difficult at all finding a pleasing, attractive and even memorable wine, provided you’re ready to pay up top money. But for most
Mas Candi Cava Brut Nature
of us that’s usually not the case. Instead, we constantly strive to find other ways to dip our glasses into a pleasing wine without having to make a major financial sacrifice. That is to say, one has to make compromises and choices. On the other side, one of the fun aspects of this passion is searching for the best wine within a given financial range. Usually, such wines often can be found in more discreet regions or in the cellars of lesser known producer. For me at least, it is even more satisfying to find really good affordable wines from top producers or from famous regions, or from notoriously difficult vintages.
Penedes is a region with much tradition and matching diversity. Still, with a thorough search, you can find exactly the revelations I was talking about above. Great Cavas can be found quite easily, and also affordable cavas. Top houses like Codorniu or Freixenet constantly deliver good value for a wide range of prices. Looking into the offer of the smaller producers however, can reveal some interesting surprises. Mas Candi can be included in the „traditionalist” tier of Cava producers, even if they are quite new on the market. Gabriella Opaz has an extensive article on Mas Candi philosophy and principles of winemaking, so there is little to add to that.
Cava Reserve and aged cheese
What stroke me about this particular wine depicted below is that I couldn’t find any information -or even pictures with this label- so far. Might this article be a premiere? I’ll be glad if it is so. The fact is that this bottle was part o a larger order on decantalo.com, included as a replacement of another bottle which was temporarily out of stock. Not even the producer’s website depicts it. So you’ll have to trust me and my tasting notes, at least until you can get hold of a bottle of your own.
So there it is: Mas Candi Cava Brut Nature Reserva, 12% alcohol. Only the local grape varieties are used -Macabeu, Parellada and Xarell.lo, with the highest proportion given to the latter. There is no dosage added, and the result is matured at least 3 years. No vintage year is stated on the label.
The color is pale straw with some golden hues; very fine and persistent bubbles throughout the entire mass of the liquid. The nose is ripe and persistent, with some hints of almonds, cured lemon rind and bees wax. There is ample acidity in the mouth, backed by round notes of chamomile, cantaloupe and a wonderful base note of aged cheese -perceivable especially in the aftertaste: pungent, ripe and dry. The perfect match was, of course, ripe and aged cheese: the fatty proteins in the cheese balance the acidity of the wine, and complement the full bodied taste.
As a general impression, this wine reminded me of a vintage car being given a fresh loud paint and put back on the streets -just like this Morris Mini cab I have spotted in London a few weeks ago.
Morris Mini London
So I proceeded to adorn the bottle is a chain watch and a Frey Wille ring. Somehow it just fits there and looks lovely, doesn’t it?
Cava Mas Candi Penedes Spanish sparkling wine
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