Celler Frisach

Celler Frisach is Francesc and Joan Ferré, who make energetic natural wines in the Terra Alta appellation of Catalonia. The surname Frisach belongs to their great-grandfather; the name Ca’ Frisach still marks the family home on the main street of their village, Corbera d’Ebre. For over two centuries, the Ferré family has farmed grapes in this area, but it was only in 2009 after Francesc returned from oenology school that the brothers decided to produce their own wines and stop selling their fruit—a change that takes gumption here, given how rare independent family wineries are in Terra Alta, let alone in their proud-but-petite hometown.

 

Francesc is one of the young stars in the thriving natural wine scene in this part of the world; you’ll see his wines on many lists in Barcelona and in well-regarded restaurants throughout Catalonia. He has a technician’s mind and is something of a perfectionist—but Joan teases that Francesc is as much astrólogo as oenologist. The desire for excellence doesn’t keep the domaine from experimenting, though; each year sees wines made with less and less intervention, lighter extraction, less power—into a more refined and transparent style. Joan and Francesc are also genuine farmers, occasionally up to their knees in mud, always in the vineyards actually doing the work. Today, the fruit of their organically-farmed 20 hectares is rendered into joyful, expressive wines, with many cuvées achieving better clarity each vintage.

 

The varieties that Joan and Francesc work with Terra Alta are as follows: the queen of the area, Vernatxa (Grenache Blanc), as well as native varieties Vernatxa Gris (the highly rare Grenache Gris), Vernatxa Fina (Grenache Noir), Carinyena, and the idiosyncratic Garnatxa Peluda and Morenillo. Given this Mediterranean paradise, with Terra Alta’s special, oceanic panal soils in the old river delta of the Ebro, it seems self-evident that special wines should be possible here. But we’re also lucky to have the Ferré brothers’ work: the Spanish Civil War ripped through their family land not two generations before. Franco’s push into this Catalan borderland scarred Terra Alta, and Corbera d’Ebre in particular, in some of the last battles of the nationalist march on Barcelona. In many ways, the wines of Celler Frisach are a testimony: to roots, to courage, to young descendants taking stock of losses in the past and giving their home a hopeful new expression.

The wines of Francesc Ferré are a love song to Terra Alta... dynamic, youthful, rural, naked, and happy. -- Joseph Roca

Wines

‘L’Abrunet’ Blanc

Varietal: Vernatxa

Color: White

Farming Practice: Certified Organic

Certified organic. The entry-level white wine at Frisach—abrunet means ‘swallow,’ the birds that grace the landscape; it represents youth and freshness for the domaine. Young-vines Vernatxa (20 year-old parcels), on iron-rich, calcareous clay at 390m above sea level. They do two passes through the vineyard for this wine, an earlier one to maintain freshness, and a later one for phenolic ripeness. Pressed and given around 12 hours’ skin contact before spontaneous fermentation in stainless steel.  Aged 3.5 months on the fine lees in stainless steel. Bottled with no additions; zero SO2.

‘L’Abrunet’ Negre

Varietal: Vernatxa Fina, Carinyena

Color: Red

Farming Practice: Certified Organic

Certified organic. The entry-level red wine at Frisach—abrunet means ‘swallow,’ the birds that grace the landscape; it represents youth and freshness for the domaine. 60% Vernatxa Fina (or Grenache Noir), 40% Carinyena, coming from two different parcels: a 26 year-old Vernatxa Fina vineyard, 425 msl, on top of a windy ridge; soils are petrified sand dunes (panal) and iron-rich calcareous clay. The other vineyard is 31 year-old Carinyena, 330 msl, on rocky calcareous clay.  The different microclimates ripen Vernatxa Fina and Carinyena together so they can be co-fermented in underground cement vats, called trulls, which Francesc’s grandparents built.  Must is retrieved bucket by bucket, pressed and transferred to the next vat, where it ages on the fine lees 5 months. Bottled with no additions; zero SO2.

‘L’Abrunet’ Rosat

Varietal: Vernatxa, Vernatxa Gris, Vernatxa Fina

Color: Rose

Farming Practice: Certified Organic

Certified Organic. 50% Vernatxa Gris, 30% Vernatxa Fina, 20% Vernatxa. (Grenache Gris, Grenache Noir, and Grenache Blanc.) Planted on calcareous clay at 400m above sea level; all the grapes for this very special rosat comes from a co-planted single vineyard; they’re also harvested together at the same time. Picked, de-stemmed/crushed, then macerated together for 24 hours before being pressed off. Only free-run juice is used, or what Francesc calls ‘just the flower of the falling grape-juice,’ for the rosat. Native yeast fermentation in stainless steel. Vernatxa Gris is especially rare as a variety, having nearly disappeared from the area, so this rosé has a lot more character than its charming exterior might suggest.

Terra Alta ‘L’Anit’

Varietal: Carinyena

Color: Red

Farming Practice: Certified Organic

Certified organic. A brand-new wine in the Frisach lineup, 100% Carinyena from the oldest vineyard in the Ferré family holdings. 80 year-old+ vines, bush-trained; grapes were fermented whole-cluster and left on skins and stems for one month. Élevage was split between 225L old barrels and concrete tank. Unfined, unfiltered, zero added SO2. Francesc calls this ‘the Poulsard of Catalonia’—hazy, with scrub herbs and dark dried berry fruit, wine with an old soul. L’Anit means ‘evening.’ Only 108 cases produced.

Terra Alta ‘Sang de Corb’

Varietal: Vernatxa Fina, Vernatxa Peluda, Carinyena

Color: Red

Farming Practice: Certified Organic

Certified organic. 40% Vernatxa Fina (Grenache Noir), 20% Vernatxa Peluda, 20% Carinyena. ‘The blood of the crow:’ a tribute to the family and town’s ancestors who shed blood in the vineyards of Corbera d’Ebre, during clashes with Franco’s troops marching on Barcelona. These varieties are co-planted in a special one-hectare vineyard planted in 1945, the ‘Dellà del Riu;’ the vines are surrounded by apple, almond, and olive trees. The grapes are co-fermented, to continue the reference to this historical style of planting grapes and making wine. Aged one year in 300L barrels, minimal SO2 at bottling. Francesc considers this red the closest to their home region’s history.

Vernatxa ‘Instint Primari’

Varietal: Vernatxa

Color: White

Farming Practice: Certified Organic

Certified organic. 24 year-old vineyard of Vernatxa. This is the wine at Frisach that strikes the most like Chablis: textured, very sandy and saline, with persistent, oceanic acidity keeping it tense; it’s definitely age-worthy. Soils are all petrified sand dunes (panal) at 400 msl; these are very windy sites. Skin-fermented for one week, then aged six months in 500L oak barrels.  No filtration, small amount of SO2 just before bottling.

Vernatxa ‘La Foradada’

Varietal: Vernatxa

Color: White

Farming Practice: Certified Organic

Certified organic. 100% Vernatxa Blanca, from a 21 year-old vineyard named ‘Finca del Quart,’ which has iron-rich, highly calcareous clay soils and is at 390m elevation.  Fermented on skins for two weeks, then pressed off and aged for nine months in stainless steel. This is Francesc’s idea of a ‘forgotten,’ or foradada, countryside wine from Corbera, a memory of the types of wines his grandfather might have made—an era of wine and time that’s disappeared but is here reinvented. Not an intense ‘orange’ wine, just a complex, slightly more physical version of Vernatxa. No fining, filtration, or added SO2.

Vernatxa Gris ‘Les Alifares’

Varietal: Vernatxa Gris

Color: Orange

Farming Practice: Certified Organic

Certified organic. 100% Vernatxa Gris.  65 year-old bush-trained Vernatxa Gris, from a single vineyard called ‘Lo Mas del Surdo:’ soils are fully panal, or petrified sand dunes, at 450 msl.  The grapes are hand-harvested and placed whole-cluster into tank.  They are then lightly foot-trod and left to ferment and age on skins for 30 days. The wine is then racked off the skins and aged on the lees for at least seven months.  This wine is one of the more elegant, structured, vibrant orange wines we know, definitely ageworthy. From Francesc’s text: ‘We came from a very dark and deep night, and all light is inadequate. We have the memory of the time marked on the skin and the seasons of the year dyed in the must.’ No fining, filtration, or added SO2.  Only 250 cs produced.

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