One of our favourite part of our job here at SIPS is having the opportunity to work with inspirational farmers and winemakers that are fighting industrial process and the 'new normal' to work harmoniously with nature and creating the wonderful wines that we call natural. The wine world can be incredibly daunting, snobby and full of misconceptions.
In this series we want to connect you with these inspirational humans that are driving change and shine a light on everything that happens behind the scenes to bring our wonderful wines into the world.
We have recently had the privilege of bringing the wines of Cosmic Vinyaters, run by Salvador Batlle, that are incredible representations of what can be done with a holistic approach farming and winemaking. His incredible wines represent Catalunia and his experience of growing up there.
1. Can you share a bit about your background and what inspired you to become a winemaker?
I was born in a vine-grower family, my mom and dad grew vineyards, they still do nowadays, and they were selling the grapes, therefore since I was very young I was already connected with the vineyard’s world.
The only thing left and pending for me was to make wine, since my family never made wine and also due to the unworthy situation I experienced from a very young age at the hands of large wineries and cooperatives that weren’t valuing the work done, and it was poorly paid. This inspired me to want to close the circle and start making wine from my work with the land.
2. What drew you specifically to natural wine as opposed to conventional wine?
It was conventional wine itself that brought me to make natural wine. The reason is very simple, since I’ve been in contact with the big industry since I was very young and I’ve seen the increasingly aggressive industrialized practices both in the vineyard, the winegrower and at the same time in making the wine, with synthetic products, which greatly alter the nature of the grapes and the juice that comes out of them.
The industry made me want to make wine in another way, although it’s the wine that has always been made in a natural way by our ancestors but with the knowledge of modern times.
3. Are there any particular experiences or mentors that have significantly influenced your winemaking philosophy?
I don’t have a specific mentor because I’ve never worked with any other winemakers. I was self-learning, but probably the more influential people were my parents since the very beginning I saw them work the vineyard and this left a big mark on me, and also they helped to settle a garage to make wine (illegally) and experiment from the age of 14. Consequently, I think this was the best school possible.
4. Your wines are beautifully fresh and expressive, and we are very excited and lucky to have them in Berlin. How would you define your philosophy and approach to winemaking?
I describe my philosophy like a persona who loves the earth and the closes circles making wine. My philosophy is based on working the land with the utmost respect, with ecological agriculture and biodynamic criteria, and also recovering local varieties, some of them still not authorised (such as gray Carignan) and above all exploring a lot in unknown territories, looking for more height due to climate change, preserving the peasant heritage we have, and working with gobelet/vas vines, the traditional Mediterranean vine.
Making wine that talks about local varieties, about a territory, wines that have in their DNA purity, cleanliness, freshness, drinkability and the ability to open doors to anyone who wants to start and simply enjoy a wine with a local character.
4. What are some typical flavours and characteristics that people might find in your wines?
There’s not an easy answer for this question since I’m making more than 16 different kind of wines but following the previous question, the wines are clean, pure, fresh, some with some spicy notes, and other more floral, with a great drinkability, salinity and sappiness, a lot of aging capacity and above all very focused on local varieties, primary characters and storage capacity.
5. Can you talk a little about the terroir and climate of Catalonia and how this is expressed through your wines?
Catalonia is a very diverse country in terms of territories. You can find calcareous clay terrain, and you can also find granitic-sandy areas. I am lucky to work with both areas, the wines I make in the Penedès area are calcareous clay soil and in the Empordà area they are granitic-sandy soil, acidic typicity. Both kinds of territories give us different kind of wines and at the same time with some similarities.
The wines that comes from a more granitic-sandy soil give us a more fine wine, more drinkability and crispy, and the wines that come from more calcareous clay soils give us more mineral wines, with more marked acidity and more enveloping.
The most important thing to take into account is what surrounds the vineyards, and that is that all the vineyards that I work in both one territory and the other are surrounded by forest and that increases the biodiversity and that the vineyards are part of the landscape.
6. A classic question - How would you explain natural wine to someone who is new to it, and is there a different term you prefer to use?
I would like to talk about natural wine only as "wine", without the typology of labels, even though I understand that nowadays there is a need to label everything. I would like to talk about "wine", but the concept of "natural" has had to be used as a result of all the interventionist actions that were born mostly from the 80s.
Natural wine is food, a way of traveling without moving, it is culture, character and local economy, health and above all a way of preserving local characters, varieties, territories and different ways of working where the vines are grown, with respect for future generations, the present and our health.
Wines that enhance food, that feel good, do not cause discomfort (consumed in moderation) and predominantly that they are living wines that make you move and that move with constant learning.
7. From your experience how does natural wine contribute to sustainability and environmental health?
Absolutely, from my personal experience, natural wine contributes to sustainability and environmental health, contributes to local economy and people who live in the countryside
and ensures that plots, paths, forests and walks are conserved and preserved, and that the people who live, grow and often reproduce, in areas where if there were no activity in the world of wine they would surely be uninhabited or would lose the preservation and ecosystem of the territory.
8 . What are some eco-friendly practices you follow in your vineyard and winery?
The practices I do in an agricultural level are eco-friendly since we work with ecological agriculture with biodynamic criteria.
I could certainly reflect on what points I could improve, and one of the most ecological practices to carry out is to consume local products. That the consumption of the wine is in the shortest possible radius of territory, try that the wine is consumed in our country or on our continent. Something that must be done little by little and with awareness.
9. What’s one thing you wish more people knew about natural wine?
I would like people to know that natural wine it’s not just a wine that doesn’t contain additives, with a “cool” label, and it’s trendy, rather than, from my point of view, natural wine talks about a winemaker, a farmer a person that takes cares of the land and has a great knowledge of the territory and understands its needs. A person who has ancestral knowledge in his hands and who must know how to preserve, communicate and transmit it to future generations. It is not only a way of making wine but a way of living, understanding and loving the land.
10. You recently started a social winemaking project. Can you tell us more about this and what your dreams and ambitions are for it?
The social project I’ve started with my partner in 2019 it’s called “Amor per la terra” (Love for the earth). It borns from all the experiences I had since a very young age where the farmer and the winemakers are mistreated by the great industry, either the wine or fruit industry or the agro-industry.
What the project does is select different farmers and winegrowers from the Catalan territory, who have great knowledge, wonderful territories and lands, but have no knowledge of the world of wine and lack of knowledge of its communication and marketing.
What we do in this collective is interpreting their plots, vinify them in the best possible way, and tell the personal story of each person who owns that piece of land in a place in the country. It is an umbrella that represents territories and people under the same brand and bond: love for the land and the people who work it.
11. Are there any other things that you would like to share about your journey or your wines?
The most relevant thing in my life path is to give a lot of importance to the power of intention. I don't want to give lessons or advice to anyone, but the power of intention, focusing on things and having an internal look has been very good for me.
All my wines have been born from an inner look, intuition, being able to be present and knowing how to decipher the messages that the earth and nature give you. The names of the wines are related to the value and intention that existed at the time of making the wine, which is in motion and constant change every year.
Therefore, intuition, internal listening and internal vision are very important, something that is increasingly difficult to achieve in the world in which we live connected to social networks and the constant inputs of technology that lead us astray if we want to go towards the Being.
And finally a run of quickfire questions:
Favourite wine you’ve ever drunk? I don’t have a favourite wine, I’ve a favourite one for each moment.
Favourite grape? Carignan White-Gray
Best wine you’ve ever made? Valentia, 2015 (Carignan White)
Favourite wine region? I can’t have favourite region, although I appreciate a lot of winemakers from all over the world.
You can find all of Salvadors wines on our website and below, happy sipping!
