"In Catalonia, little alcohol is consumed relative to production; however, beer is the preferred beverage."

Vilanova i la GeltrúIsabelle Brunet (Vausseroux, 1967) has succeeded in getting her first two wines, a red and a white, both named Calcite, served in Catalan and French restaurants. In Barcelona, ​​they are available at Alkimia, Teórico, and Palma de Bellafila. In Paris, they can be found at Baccarat, owned by chef Alain Ducasse, and in Madrid, at the Gran Hotel Inglés. In between these cities, many other restaurants, especially in the Garraf region, have requested Calcite white and red from the self-taught winemaker to add to their wine lists. However, reaching this milestone has been a long journey, one she has taken with small but sure steps.

It all began in her parents' bar in the French town of Vausseroux. There, Isabelle, as well as her brother Christophe, helped out wherever needed. “I always say that I was a waitress when I was ten, because I carried the plates to the tables,” says Isabelle one autumn afternoon at her brother Christophe’s house (Vausseroux, 1969), in Vilanova i la Geltrú, where she also lives. We are surrounded by wines, lots of wines, and also by family furniture that preserves the memories of the two siblings from their parents’ bar. They even have a foosball table, a chest of drawers, and an electric bicycle (a Solex), which is probably the early predecessor of today’s electric bikes. “And it works perfectly despite its age,” says Isabelle. The fact is that she was a waitress when she was ten and learned the trade, as well as how to tend the family garden. “The priest used to come to the bar to play cards because it was located across from the church,” recalls Isabelle, who adds that her mother cooked for two hundred people a day when the town had only four hundred registered residents. This detail is important; Isabelle emphasizes this because it's the only way to convey how essential her work of serving food and wine was.

As an adult, at eighteen, she set off to travel the world. France, England, Germany, Australia. She worked in prestigious restaurants like the Ritz, the London Casino, and finally, Barcelona, ​​where she arrived in 2000. "Always learning the trade on my own, through daily practice," she says. In Catalonia, she went to eat at El Bulli one day, and the beloved Juli Soler offered her a job. It was May 2000, and she wasn't aware of the magnitude of the offer, of what the restaurant represented. And she stayed. "I worked for two years, in the restaurant and also in the workshop; and I worked alongside Ferran Centelles and David Seijas." A few years later, Isabelle met the businessman Sergi Ferrer-Salat, owner of the Ventanas Bookstore and a winemaker in the Priorat DOQ, and explained to him the restaurant she wanted to open on Diputació Street. It was 2004, and the restaurant aspired to become Barcelona's premier establishment, boasting a world-class wine list and a cuisine that always featured local, seasonal ingredients. Isabelle spent four years developing the wine list, and in 2008, Món Vínic opened its doors. After the pandemic, Sergi Ferrer-Salat decided to close the restaurant and transform it into the Ventanas Bookstore.

More beer is consumed in Catalonia

With all this experience, the winemaker confesses that she could describe the relationship between the cultures in which she has lived and worked and wine. "In Catalonia, people drink very little wine compared to the amount produced; on the other hand, beer is the preferred drink, across various age groups," she states, adding that there have also been changes in winemaking trends: "Aging wine in new oak is considered to be masking it, dressing it up, because what's desired nowadays is..." She certainly has the knowledge; she also had it when she finished her job at the Món Vínic restaurant, but it had been such an intense period in her life that Isabelle says she needed a few years to grieve. During this time, she met Marcelo Desvalls, winemaker at the Viladellops winery in the Garraf Massif (DO Penedès). "I fell in love with the landscape, and I asked him if I could make my own wine." And that's how her winemaking adventure began. Currently, she has the 2023 and 2024 vintages for sale. "The 2025 vintages are in casks and demijohns," she explains. There's a white and a red, and they're named Calcite after the type of soil where the vineyard is located, which is limestone, because in ancient times the area was bathed by the sea. In fact, marine fossils have been found in the soil that attest to this past. "With these calcareous soils, I aim for freshness, acidity, minerality, and light body because there's no new oak."

The grape varieties she uses are Xarel-lo, red Xarel-lo, and Malvasia de Sitges for the white Calcite; and Garnacha and Cariñena for the red Calcite. "I work the vineyards with the winemaker Carlos Nieto, and the wine rests in demijohns, which help preserve the acidity, and in old oak barrels." As she explains this, Isabelle is clearly excited. Making her wines means investing her life savings and putting in all her effort. "I sell the wines myself, directly, and I also have a distributor, Ithaca Wines, that helps me."

The work that began when she was ten years old, serving wines in the bar of her French village, became a passion, "a contagious passion," to which she became hooked forty years ago, and in which she has had mentors like Juli Soler and Sergi Ferrer-Salat. "Wine is my lifeblood; I always have a snack while I eat," she says.

Finally, the winemaker believes that Catalan wines still need to gain a stronger foothold on restaurant wine lists. "It's true that Catalan wine is more expensive, but it's also local and, therefore, better," she concludes.