The Vall Llach winery will produce wines outside the DOQ Priorat and create a line of kombutxa teas.

PorreraWinemaker Albert Costa and the director of the Vall Llach winery, Isa Serra, confirm they are preparing two new production lines, alternatives to those they operate at the Vall Llach winery. Both will be located on another estate called Horta Colomer, in the same town of Porrera, where they will produce wines with a lower alcohol content. They will also have kombutxa, which will be called La Forastera. At l'Horta Colomer, they have planted vineyards of the Garnacha variety, a vegetable garden, a goose farm, and a recreational area. All in the middle of Porrera, a few steps from the town square, and with the Cortiella River, now in full flow, running alongside.

This week, in the garden, they began planting aromatic herbs, and later they will grow vegetables, cucumber, beets, carrots, and other produce, with which they will make kombutxa teas. The non-alcoholic beverage project is a project that Isa Serra links to her childhood, at home, where her parents prepared water kefir and yogurt, two fermented beverages, just like kombutxa teas. "It's a fascinating world, that of fermentation, and in the training I've done, that feeling is contagious, because when you start investigating it, you realize all the possibilities it has," explains Isa, who adds that the kombutxa tea line is presented as refreshments, as an entry into the mind, as alternative drinks to alcohol, like probiotics, which are good for the body. "We know this is true, but the world of nutrition is beyond our knowledge, and we focus on preparation as we've learned, especially with non-alcoholic soft drinks in mind," says Isa Serra.

Lower alcohol content

There is also a vineyard in l'Horta Colomer, which extends throughout the town of Porrera. This town welcomes everyone with the lyrics of the song Porrera, by Lluís Llach, which is written in wrought iron and reads "I love this land like a faithful and ardent lover." And with this vineyard, of the Garnacha variety, winemaker Albert Costa's intention is to continue producing the Horta Colomer single-vineyard wine from the Vall Llach winery. However, with the vineyards located in other parts of the town, the objective they are working towards is to produce wines that will be located outside the DOQ Priorat because they will have a lower alcohol content than permitted by the DOQ regulations. "The world evolves, and the regulations of the designations of origin do not; we have wanted to make wines with a lower alcohol content for a long time, and the only way to achieve this is by going outside," says winemaker Albert Costa. "They will not be new wines, but rather they will be Women's wines, the solidarity project, named Joaquima, Matilde and Catalina, which we will remove from the DOQ Priorat to assign them to the new company, Horta Colomer, and this is where we will be able to play with the alcohol levels, which we will be able to bottle with a lower alcohol content," he adds. Albert Costa and Isa Serra will allocate the sale of the charity wines to the elderly people of Porrera. "The second year of Porrera, who decide what they want to use them for," they explain.

Under the Horta Colomer brand, they will also market Ancestral, which they have been producing for years, but which they had never put on sale, because the DOQ Priorat regulations do not allow it either. "We want this new company to have future continuity with other projects we envision, and for now they are these: kombutxa teas, Ancestral, and solidarity wines, with a lower alcohol content," explains Isa Serra. "We pushed the idea of diversifying because we want to have a strong enough muscle to maintain what we consider more solid and important, and precisely with these wines we produce, we maintain the vineyards and the landscape of Porrera," she adds.

Another new development being prepared by the Vall Llach winery is a change to the labeling of one of the winery's flagship wines, Embruix. With a new image by illustrator Guillem Bosch, the Embruix wine will highlight the blue full moon, illuminating the town of Porrera, both in white and red, with its entire expanse and surrounding mountains.

Finally, the winery's director, Isa Serra, points out the uncertainties surrounding the future of winemaking in our country and around the world. Beyond the tariffs decreed and the fingers of US President Donald Trump, which has now led them to prepare shipments quickly, there's the fact that they have to address how the vineyard will be able to withstand climate change. The same is true when they're in sunny conditions, as is the case with the vineyard planted at Mas de la Rosa, for example. And another very important factor is the decline in global wine consumption, and the fact that alcohol is increasingly in the spotlight. The future is uncertain, and diversifying production with new and different offerings may be one way to address it.