Perhaps you are familiar with the outlines of the Enric Soler mythos: Enric was the Sommelier of El Bulli, won the Spanish Sommelier of the Year award in 1997, and quietly retired from restaurants to train the next generation of wine stewards in Barcelona. As a side project in 2004, Enric began tinkering with a tiny 1ha plot of Xarel·lo left to him by his grandfather, an endeavor that was quickly recognized as one of the great white wines in the world. Heading into its 22nd vintage, the domaine is fully biodynamic, farmed by hand by Enric and his wife Mercè and comprises slightly less than 4ha - a slight decrease from previous years as the Catalan government built a road through a block of old vine malvasia in 2022, which goes to show that while he’s one of the world’s great white wine makers, he’s still, perhaps, not at the apex of his fame. This, of course, should be a sign for you all to squirrel away some bottles for yourself.
From humble roots as a Catalan nerd shibboleth, a secret handshake between iberian focused devotees – “yeah, it’s Xarel·lo - one of the grapes from cava, but this lunatic makes it into a still wine!” – Enric’s wines attracted the attention of the neo-burghound community, who saw in his barrel programs, site-specificity and lees-forward aging a kindred spirit. No doubt, quite a few of you reading this were introduced to Soler by this crew or their high-end sommelier attendants – the Nun, especially, is relished as a blind tasting ‘gotcha’ or as a chardonnay-esque curveball on a forward-thinking tasting menu. To this, we say the wines are as ‘Burgundian’ as people claim, but that’s only because of cultural failure of imagination where we cannot imagine this kind of obsession and monastic devotion outside of the Côte d’Or. Sure, Xarel·lo does a convincing chardonnay impression when young, but after a few years in bottle there’s a crushed herb spine that juts out like a eldrich threat display on these fuckers and after that, the sheer Mediteraneanosity of these wines becomes more than apparent. That’s when they really come into their own.
Make no mistake, all the superlatives heaped on Soler are true – these are unicorn wines of uncommon poise and technical precision. So often, on wines this rare, one begins to worry about wines becoming investment pieces rather than actually hitting tables and blowing wigs back. While we cannot arbitrate how you enjoy these wines, we really do want to suggest that these wines are truly begging to be shared and appreciated. Enric Soler has been, frankly, one of the wisest long shots we’ve invested in and we are beyond unreasonably proud of their work. Over the last almost decade (!) the wines have steadily gotten better, which is rare enough, but they’ve also got more interesting as well as he’s gained confidence in his ineffable terroir to match his well-honed cellar work. While the wines have always been important references, they have never been as vital and delicious.