# Memòries del Priorat Vi Ranci Dolç (2022)

- **Producer:** Costers del Priorat
- **Colour:** white
- **Type:** dessert
- **Grapes:** Garnatxa Blanca
- **Region:** Catalonia, Spain
- **Style:** Classic
- **Alcohol:** 16.0%
- **Average price:** €27
- **Vegan:** Yes
- **Contains sulphites:** Yes
- **When to drink:** Now or Later
- **Serving temperature:** 10–14 °C
- **Aromas & flavours:** apricot, orange, grape, peach, toast, coffee, chocolate, smoke, honey, almond, hazelnut, dried fig, tobacco, caramel, toffee, dried apricot

## About this wine

Costers del Priorat, led by enologist Jose Mas Barberà, manages high-altitude mountain vineyards across steep slate slopes in Catalonia's DOQ Priorat. Memòries del Priorat is a tribute to an ancestral Catalan tradition where families kept a mother barrel ('la mare') of oxidative wine in their cellar to pass down through generations. This bottling combines naturally dried grapes with a portion of historic family solera dating back to 1927.

## Interesting facts

- Inspired by the Catalan tradition of gifting a portion of a family's solera barrel to children when starting a home.
- Includes a portion of a historic family solera dating back to 1927.
- Grapes are sun-dried on steep slate terraces (costers) before pressing to naturally concentrate sugars.
- Aged in century-old oak barrels undergoing deliberate oxidative aging.

## Food pairing

The rich sweetness, intense dried fruit complexity, and vibrant acidity of this oxidative dessert wine require rich, intensely flavored, or salty accompaniments. High fat and salt in blue cheeses cut through the sweetness, while nutty and chocolate desserts mirror its deep oxidized and caramelized profile.

## Wine making process

Made from 100% Garnatxa Blanca grown on red llicorella slate soils at 300 to 375 meters elevation. The hand-harvested grapes undergo sun-drying ('assolellat') on steep terraces to naturally concentrate sugars and flavors before gentle pressing. Fermentation occurs spontaneously with indigenous yeasts and stops naturally due to high sugar levels. The wine is then blended into century-old oak barrels containing a 20% proportion of a 1927 family solera for oxidative aging.