Winemaker Notes
Manuel Raventós Negra, descendent de Josep Maria Raventós i Blanc is the personal selection Manuel Raventós makes of the best wines of the vintage. It is his personal coupage. A signature sparkling wine. For lovers of fresh wines with acidity, structure and volume, tense on the palate, with fine bubbles and aromas of toast and butter. A golden colour. A sparkling wine that, due to its exceptional character, is only bottled in the most exceptional vintages.
Blend: 70% Xarel·lo, 30% Macabeu
Professional Ratings
-
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The bright golden-colored 2017 Manuel Raventós Negra has a complex nose of baked apples, spicy and nuanced. This is the personal selection that Manuel Raventós makes from the best wines each vintage to produce age-worthy wines. In 2017, which started wet and finished warm and dry, it was produced with 70% Xarel.lo and 20% Macabeo from vines that were already certified organic. It fermented in stainless steel and was kept with the lees in concrete for nine months, after which time, it was put in bottle to referment and age with lees for no less than 70 months. It has a beautiful, developed nose, obviously more oxidative but time has given it great complexity and elegance. The bubbles have integrated and shrunk in size and quantity, giving it a silky texture—texture more than anything. It only has 1.6 grams of residual sugar and finishes dry and long. It's a wine that gives a lot of pleasure. 2,125 bottles and 158 magnums produced. It was disgorged in November 2024, the bottling date printed on the back label.
-
Wine Spectator
An expressive, finely meshed sparkler, sculpted by vivid lemon peel acidity and a subtle streak of salinity. Offers flavors of baked plum and chopped almond, with richer hints of marzipan, macerated peach, licorice and candied ginger carried on the luxurious, satiny mousse. Xarel-lo and Macabeo. Disgorged March 2024. Drink now through 2032.
Representing the topmost expression of a Champagne house, a vintage Champagne is one made from the produce of a single, superior harvest year. Vintage Champagnes account for a mere 5% of total Champagne production and are produced about three times in a decade. Champagne is typically made as a blend of multiple years in order to preserve the house style; these will have non-vintage, or simply, NV on the label. The term, "vintage," as it applies to all wine, simply means a single harvest year.
A superior source of white grapes for the production of Spain’s prized sparkling wine, Cava, the Penedes region is part of Catalunya and sits just south of Barcelona. Medio Penedès is the most productive source of the Cava grapes, Macabeo, Xarel-lo, and Parellada. Penedes also grows Garnacha and Tempranillo (here called Ull de Llebre in Catalan), for high quality reds and rosès.