Joe Ray

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December 29, 2005 - The Santa Fe New Mexican

SANT SADURNÍ D’ANOIA , Spain — It’s a very curious idea, competing with Champagne. Paris’ preferred bubbly is the only one worth its salt and it has the market pretty well covered on the pop-a-cork instant celebration, n’est ce pas?

Clearly, thoughts like these could only have come from someone who hasn’t visited Spain’s Catalan region. Here, it’s another ball of wax. Or another bottle of sparkling wine, as a few hours in Barcelona proves.

La Boqueria is one of the most impressive food markets in the world, where even the Parisians could learn a thing or two. Here, rows and rows of vendors sell stunning fruits, meats and vegetables, culminating in a central display of fish so fresh it seems to have a layer of mother of pearl sprayed over the top.

Here and there, between the food stands, are what are traditionally known as kioscos — food stalls that use the best and freshest foods of the market for dishes often made right before your eyes.

At the good ones, clients crawl over one another for a stool at the bar — and many of these customers drink cava like it’s going out of style.

Cava is the sparkling wine, native to this region, made by the méthode champenoise — fermenting the wine first in casks or vats, with a second fermentation in the bottle in which it will eventually be sold.

Although many types of bubbly are produced using this process — Italy’s spumantes and the French crémants are two — only sparkling wines produced in the Champagne region of France are allowed to carry that elite label.

There are other differences between cava and Champagne. While Champagne is made with combinations of chardonnay, pinot noir and pinot meunier grapes, here in Catalan, they use chardonnay, macabello, xarel-lo and parellada grapes, producing a much dryer bubbly that makes a perfect apéritif and matches beautifully with seafood.

The best of La Boqueria’s kioscos is Pinotxo — Pinocchio in the Catalan dialect — where, from six in the morning until four in the afternoon, they serve up hundreds of dishes. Cava is such a popular accompaniment with their plates, the stand has its own house label, made for them by Torrelló .

And the closest thing the stand has to a business card is the metal cap that goes over the wine cork, which bears Pinotxo’s logo and phone number.

“We go through 30 bottles a day,” says chef Jordi Asim, who runs Pinotxo with his brother and uncle. No mean feat, considering there are only 24 stools.

“The guy at Torelló loves us!” Asim says.

Have a glass of the house cava with a plate of oysters or Albert Asim’s wokseared baby squid with white beans and the bubbles might just lift you straight up to gastronomic heaven.

The kicker? At Pinotxo, a glass of cava sets you back a whole 2.50 euros — less than the price of a latté in your favorite stateside coffee shop.

This mix of affordability and bubbly bliss is the niche cava has created for itself at home — and it’s slowly doing the same in the United States.

Prices for decent Champagne begin at around $30 and skyrocket from there. For that same $30, you can get some of the best cava available.

It’s this sort of math that’s left most of Spain with a “Why bother?” attitude toward anything bubbly other than cava. It’s not thought of as a secondrate tipple here — an idea that a handful of producers in the country’s cava capital, Sant Sadurní d’Anoia , are trying to export across The Pond.

“It used to be that everything that was good here was imported. It was cooler to get Champagne when you brought a girl out,” says Jaume Gramona, head cava maker at Gramona, S.A.

Gramona says that on the days when he works out in the morning, he has a breakfast of tomato bread and washes it down with a glass of cava.

Bringing this sort of widespread acceptance to the North American market is a bit trickier ; in the United States, sparkling-wine consumption still is limited primarily to weddings, New Year’s Eve, ship christenings and other special events.

Apart from Freixenet and Codorníu, two of the best known Spanish-export bubbly brands, only a handful of the country’s sparkling-wine producers are making their way into the market by providing a lot of bubbles for the buck.

“Now, you can buy a couple bottles of good cava for the price of one good bottle of Champagne,” says Gramona.

Back in Barcelona, it’s easy to see the difference. At Quimet & Quimet, a great-find tapas bar that specializes in wines and spirits, bottles of cava run from 8 to 35 euros (about $10 to $40). Champagne begins at 20 euros and finishes at 150 (about $25 to $175).

Cava’s popularity in Spain has knocked out most would-be competitors, making it largely a two-bubbly market. The Catalans will tell you that the Champagne is for foreigners and those who want to show off — cava is for those who know better.

“Here, you can have a glass of cava every day,” says bar owner Quim Pérez . “You can’t do that in France.”

Sure enough, people spill in and out of Quimet & Quimet’s door every day, many washing down their food with a flute of their favorite bubbly.

“Are we proud of cava?” asks Quim. “Of course! My mother nursed me on the stuff.”

On other shores, it’s a much different ballgame. “In the United States, there is no perception of what cava is,” says Josep Jové , export manager at Spanish producer Albet i Noya. In the United States, cava has yet to become popular. “Most people think of it as “the cheap champagne that comes from Spain,” he admits. But what Albet i Noya, Gramona , and other small producers are doing these days is sending some of their best product to the United States, hoping to sway Americans on both its quality and bang for the buck.

The wineries’ work is slowly paying off. Gramona’s 2002 Cava Grande Cuvée , which sells for all of $15, received a score of 89 in the June 30 issue of The Wine Advocate. Many other brands of cava have won fine reviews as well.

Which words were underlined in the Gramona review? “Fine value.”

IF YOU GO
Barcelona is easy to reach via plane from most major American cities; it’s also a major train hub for Spain. Where to stay Wherever you take a room, ask for a quiet one — the streets of Barcelona can get loud.

HOTEL LA FLORIDA Vallvidrera a Tibidabo 83-89 http://www.hotellaflorida.com Barcelona is at your feet at this Mt. Tibidabo splurge. Doubles start at 195 euros ($230) and go up to 1,000 ($1,200) for the “design suite.”

HOTEL SAN AUGUSTIN Placa de Sant Agusti, 3 http://www.hotelsa.com Perfect for those who like to be in the center of the action, only a short walk from La Rambla and on the edge of what is arguably becoming the city’s hippest neighborhood. Doubles at 140 euros ($170).

HOTEL PARAL-LEL Poeta Cabanyes 5 www.nnhotels.es A nice, less-expensive option only a stone’s throw away from Quimet & Quimet. Rooms cost 70 to 80 euros ($83-95 ), plus tax.

Where to eat

QUIMET & QUIMET Poeta Cabanyes, 25 08004 Barcelona Creative tapas made with incredible canned and prepared ingredients, served up with cava by the glass. Dishes around $3; plan on ordering several.

PINOTXO Inside the Boqueria market on La Rambla - Some of Barca’s best food, cooked before your eyes. A foodie paradise where wellknown chefs stop in for a bite before doing their own shopping . A meal and drinks should run about $25.

CAL XIM Placa Subirats, 4 08739 Sant Pau d’Ordal http://www.calxim.com Here in a village above Sant Sadurní d’Anoia , you can enjoy simple food, perfectly made, much of it in a fireplace. The lamb comes from a farmer a short distance away. When in season, the roasted artichokes are wonderful. Main dishes run about $15. Let the hot-ticket sommelier who got tired of the Barcelona glitz guide you through their excellent wine choices.

CATA 181 Valencia, 181 08011 Barcelona http://www.cata181.com

RESTAURANTOC Girona, 59 08009 Barcelona http://www.tocbcn.com Hard to say how long these trendy places will be around, but the local foodie crowd frequenting them is a good sign. Put on your snazziest duds and prepare to blow anywhere between $50 to a c-note per person. Just make sure you start off with a bottle of bubbly.

IDEAL COCKTAIL BAR Aribau, 89 08036 Barcelona This is one of the oldest and classiest bars in town and one of the first to serve cava by the glass.

For more information

BARCELONA TOURISM BUREAU Several located across town http://www.barcelonaturisme.com

CATALONIA TOURISM BUREAU Palau Robert Pg de Gracia, 107 http://www.catalunyaturisme.com

Joe Ray is a freelance food writer based in Paris. He can be contacted via his Web site, www.joe-ray.com.