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Alex: So it would be a El Bandarra Al Fresco and tonic for sure. And I would say, Formentera, it’s a little Island, close to Ibiza. Very, very cute and very small, it’s a paradise. That’s what I would and where I would drink Susan: Now Aperitivo drinking, as opposed to the hour of the vermouth – the hour that is the whole day. I know a lot about the Italian Aperitivo culture. Is it the same in Spain and in Barcelona? This stylish aperitivo transports ya straight to Florence (that's the brand's hometown, FYI). It's made with a whopping 34 botanicals, including rhubarb, iris and olive leaves - there's LAYERS to this baby. Do as Luca does and serve it sans soda for maximum flavour. SPRITZ IT El Bandarra Vermouth stands as a testament to Spain's rich history of vermouth production. Crafted by the Virgili brothers, Albert and Alex, the brand showcases the traditions of their Catalan homeland. Susan: I love that it’s called the “Hour of Vermouth. It seems to last all afternoon, even though it’s technically one hour. So, when you went to your family, your dad and mom and said, “Do we make vermouth?” What was in your head? What did you want to create and how did you go about creating it?
We created a few, very successful white wines before Bandarra. One which was called El Xitxarel·lo, which means a young, stupid guy in Catalan. While we are Catalan, we are very proud to be Catalan, our idiom is full of insults and swear words. It’s a very rich language in terms of insults. At the point when we launched, two years before launching El Bandarra, we launched this white wine, which has 67 insults on the screen-printed label.Susan: Oh, that sounds divine. Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate it. Thank you for being on the show and, hopefully, I’ll see you in Formentera. Alex: I’m El Bandarra, but it was my brother’s idea. We are a great team, Albert and I spent most, all, of our whole life together. We are twins and he’s a genius, he’s a super creative person. He came up with this idea, so I always say that he’s the software and I’m the hardware. Perennially popular across Europe for centuries, many household names – including Campari and Aperol – continue to use the same sacred recipes, but there’s also a new wave of producers who have set out to shake up the status quo. How to drink apéritifs Alex: No, the Rojo, the one that you have there, it’s in Catalan. As I told you, if we’re Catalonia, we sell the screen-printed bottles in Catalan and for the rest of Spain, we sell it in Spanish. If you want to preserve your language, you need to speak it, use insults also and the tapas and everything. That’s why we have the Spanish bottle and the Catalan bottle. Now the answer to your question about how we drink it. Our grandparents used to use a siphon or soda. It was typical. Now, it’s great to drink it over ice with a slice of orange and an olive, because I have an addiction to olives!
An aperitivo cannot be without anything to eat,” he says. “At the same time as you're drinking, you eat the olives. I think that really completes the whole experience.” We add some alcohol at the vermouth house for 15% of alcohol volume. And at that moment, we add the sweetness. The traditional method is adding a little bit of caramel and the old vermouths in Spain do it. It’s the traditional way to do it. Alex: It’s the same. That’s the nicest thing of the wild hipsters, they get it. They’ve fallen in love with the traditions and they are doing them the same way. It’s called “La Hora del Vermut,” the vermouth hour. It’s during weekend, Saturday and Sunday from 12:00 to 3:00 PM.
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Alex: There were a lot of soda brands. So, during the early Eighties, Seventies, all over Spain, in every little town, there was a carbonicus. A carbonicus was where distributors used to refill bottles of soda. They were everywhere. There were hundreds of different brands that used to use this kind of bottle that we have. It has this tap mechanical tap. Suddenly, the system was not, in terms of sanitization, it was not the proper.
Alex: So, imagine when my grandparents started in 1962, basically they bought a winery and they started selling bulk wine. At that point, the wine consumption in Spain was so high. It was around 70 liters per person per year of consumption, which now is less than 20. That’s the reality. El Bandarra Vermouth is made from high-quality Macabeo and Xarel·lo grapes, native to the region. Once these grapes are transformed into wine, they are aged in wooden barrels and later macerated with a careful blend of botanicals, including wormwood, orange, and elderflower, among others. This intricate process provides the drink with its distinct flavour and aromatic profile. Founded by twins Alex and Albert Virgili, the duo merge their experience with the wine industry to create a lineage of innovative wine-based aperitivo that speak to the free-flowing culture of Barcelona. Balancing the bittersweet with Mediterranean botanicals, El Bandarra ensure there is a drink to suit every tastebud — all whilst keeping the energy high and the good times great.Obviously, in Italy, we make the Spritz with Prosecco,” explains Luca. “If you go to France, they will tell you it should be with Champagne or Crémant, and everywhere else it’s different.” There’s plenty of opportunity to play around with your vino of choice, from Cava, to English sparkling, to new non-alc options and more. DITCH OR SWITCH THE SODA
Susan: How were they drinking it? In the Sixties, Seventies, Eighties? Now, is it pretty much the same? I’m talking traditional vermouth drinking. The bitter flavours of orange, rhubarb or [herbs] like rosemary are really good to open up your palate, and they really stimulate your appetite,” Luca says. With this in mind, you can swap the orange stuff for a bitter with botanicals that sound awesome to you. Keep reading for four of our fave bottles. CONSIDER THE WINE Alex: We have an obsession for this. Now we are working on a campaign for Al Fresco, our new aperitive. In our new campaign, we will talk about our grannies, our abuela’s. Wanna get really wild? Spike your Spritz with a fun, flavoured liqueur or cordial. The team at British aperitivo brand Sipello like to use an elderflower liqueur in their Spritz (see their recipe below), but you can add anything with complementary flavours: coffee, fruit-based and floral liqueurs are all fair game. GO FOR THE GARNISH
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Alex: Okay. My name is Alex Virgili and I’m from Barcelona. I was born in a family-owned winery in Barcelona province. I have a twin brother, I’m three minutes older than he. We are the young crowd of a winery. Alex: We launch Al Fresco in July 2020. So, we were in the middle of a pandemic. We thought, okay. But I have to say that even from all from our learnings, mainly in the UK market, we tried to push the serve as how we drink it in Barcelona or in Madrid or all over Spain. The drink typically has three ingredients - a bitter, a sparkling wine and soda water - but with a little imagination, you can make the Spritz all your own. To help you tap into your Spritz intuition, here are our pro tips - featuring expert input from Luca, of course. According to Luca, soda isn’t 100% necessary to making an epic Spritz - he says it can make the drink too watered down. Susan: Okay. Yes, we like our crazy ideas they’re going to work. Right. Where did you start? What was your thinking and how long did it take to get the first thing in the bottle that you liked?
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