Parés Baltà

The Free Bacchus Story

The first vines at Parés Baltà were planted in 1790, and they still surround the farmhouse at Pacs del Penedès where the family makes its wine. The family has bottled its own wine since 1970. Today the winemaking is led by Marta Casas, with her husband Josep Cusiné and his brother Joan.

Its organic certificate comes from the CCPAE, Catalonia's organic council, and the EU's register shows it valid to June 2028, covering the vineyards, the cava and the still wines. The family has also farmed biodynamically since 2012, it says, with its own flock of sheep and its own bees. When we read its Demeter record on 9 October 2026, it was still dated to 31 March 2026, with no renewal published, while most of the other Spanish Demeter operators we checked had already moved on to 2027. Until a renewal appears, we list Parés Baltà on its organic certificate.

The wine to know is Blanca Cusiné, a cava from the family's Les Valls estate, named for Blanca, the youngest daughter of Joan Cusiné and winemaker María Elena, who was born in 2002, the year of its first vintage. It ages for at least 80 months in the bottle before release. It is also Brut Nature, which means no sugar is added at the end. In Champagne and Cava that last dose of sugar, called the dosage, sets how the finished wine tastes and softens its sharpness. Blanca Cusiné goes without it.

The estate sits in the Penedès, between Barcelona and Tarragona, about 30 km from the Mediterranean. Its still wines carry the DO Penedès name, and since the 2025 harvest every DO Penedès wine has had to be organic, which the appellation says makes it the world's first all-organic wine appellation. Parés Baltà says its vines were certified organic in 2002, more than twenty years before that.