Escabeces
Escabeces started life as a new project from René Barbier of Priorat and Monstant fame. He was approached by his aquanitance – Oriol Pérez de Tudela, a farmer from Tarragona – to see if he’d be interested in making a wine from a small parcel of 65-year-old Cartoixà Vermell, the very rare Catalan grape also known as red Xarel.lo. The trick with this wine is that, while it presents as a rosé, it is made as if it were a red wine. The Cartoixà Vermell, however, never develops a tremendous amount of pigment, so even with a long skin maceration, the wine only achieves a coppery-pink color.
Oriol is now soley in charge of Escabeces, and has added a new wine to the lineup, “Vila Abellus”, sourced from the local vineyards. Each wine is a striking expression of a rare native grape of unmistakable Mediterranean origin.