RANCI DOLÇ DE MARTINET
I come from the south, from a warm territory, a territory rich in history.
I was ten years old when I tried a ranci wine for the first time. I went with my father to a meeting with Assumpció Peyra from Escaladei. From the physical and emotional height of childhood, the wine cellar looked old, humid, dark and cold, and the lively discussions between Assumpció and my father were like aggressive elements. I was scared and too bored. After a while, which felt like an eternity, Assumpció invited us to visit la Sala dels Àngels (“the Angels Room”). It was an exciting space, even older than the rest of the wine cellar, and which emitted the emanations and scents from other generations: the room of rancio wines. She let me try a barrel of 1964, a sweet ranci wine. I fell in love with it, it took my fear away, it cheered me up, and it made me feel like home, protected.
I thought that, if one day I was going to be in the wine production business, I would make a wine like that one.
In the summer of 1995, already working in Mas Martinet and helping my father, I stayed for some months in the Peralada Castle preparing the new wine laboratory. During the long summer afternoons of July, I went for a walk around the vineyards of Pau, Garriguella and nearby just to not lose contact with a nature that, for me, was necessary and addictive. I went to visit a peasant farmer with whom I talked about life, about the profession and about memory, and the last day of my stay in Empordà, he came to say goodbye to me with a special bottle from his winery.
It was a sweet rancio wine. Once again, I felt protected, caressed by many generations. I felt like home.
I remembered the promise made in Escaladei in November of 1982. Then, that September of 1995, the Martinet Ranci Dolç was born, but I wasn’t aware of it yet.
Almost 20 years have gone by to show us, maybe our less representative wine as a wine company, but which carries the soul and the history of Priorat.
Rancio wines are wines made to receive, to thank, to share. We put them on the table for Festa Major, for harvests celebrations, for the birth of a child, and we can enjoy them because many generations have taken care of that first barrel.
Being successors of a long history which represents us makes us feel more rooted and able to thank and pay tribute to those generations that have made it possible for us to be here today.
Sara Pérez
Mas Martinet
