Sol i Serena Productes was founded by Eduard Pla i Mestras in 2019 with the aim of distributing the family-tradition ratafia, inspired by the recipe
of Francesc Pla i Rodas and Isabel Mestras i Castañé.
We are a family business, in which several members collaborate in the production of an excellent ratafia. Malhivern is crafted from an award-winning formula recognized at the Santa Coloma de Farners Ratafia Festival. Rooted in the local tradition and closely connected to the cork industry of Cassà de la Selva, we proudly offer a high-quality product.
We move around Catalonia participating in craft fairs throughout the year. In order to have a socially responsible commitment, we collaborate and are partners with the NGO HealthUsNepal, which advocates for a very noble cause. The association, promoted by Marc Boix i Bruguera (our childhood friend), works in the north-west of Nepal, helping to improve the health of the people who live in this remote region.
History
Francesc Pla i Rodas was a chemist by profession and a passionate enthusiast of nature and the local region. He was closely linked to the associative world from a young age, being part of Jovent del Poble, Els Voltamons and he was also president of Centre Excursionista Farners and collaborator of Quaderns la Selva.
He was a scholar of the figure of the bandit Joan Sala i Viladrau, known as Serrallonga. This passion inspired the creation of a route that traverses the places he would have frequented. Francesc was one of the promoters of the GR-178 or Serrallonga route, which circulates through wild paths and paths of the Guilleries mountain range.
https://www.laselvaturisme.com/directori/que-fer/cicloturisme-btt/ruta-den-serrallonga-gr-178/
From a young age, he developed an interest in the liquors crafted by grandmothers in our town and went on to publish one of the first articles about ratafia:
In 1980, in collaboration with the Jovent del Poble association, the Ratafia Festival was established with the goal of introducing and popularizing this little-known liquor. Thus, the concept of a homemade ratafia competition was born.
Alongside his wife Isabel Mestras Castañé, born in Cassà de la Selva, they crafted an exquisite ratafia. They presented it into the ratafia contest, where it won two first prizes, two second prizes, and a third prize. This marked the beginning of a family tradition: harvesting herbs and aromatic plants near Farners, drying them, and making ratafia around Sant Joan each year.
Eduard Pla i Mestras, their son, a biologist with a postgraduate in Distilled Drinks and Fermentations, was deeply inspired from a young age by his love for nature, the region, aromatic plants, and ratafia. His passion was so profound that he undertook one of the first studies on ratafia, analysing parameters that hadn’t been considered previously and proposing solutions.
From a young age, along with his sister Maria, they lived very intensely the ratafia party, setting up a stop where the visitors could taste water from the different springs of the town with anise candy.
After the death of Francesc in 2015, Mariona Julià came up with the idea of producing a ratafia
in a more professional manner instead of homemaking it it. That allowed us to share it with the local community
using the familiar recipe as a tribute to Francesc and his legacy.
We reached out to Àngel Portet of Licors Portet from la Pobla de Segur. We proposed the idea to him and got to work.
We made the first ratafia macerated in Licors Portet.
We wanted a label that represented Francesc’s legacy and with the collaboration of Jep Pla, Maria Pla Mestras designed a label that represents Serrallonga’s route.
We announced the family project during the 2016 ratafia festival.
The project kept growing, and in the summer of 2019, we decided to invest in our own factory.
The venue was in ruins. We fixed it up, repointing the walls, changing the roof, installing drains, toilets and adapting it for beverage production.
The renovation took months of work and it was slowed down by the pandèmic. Finally, in April 2022 we opened the factory and since then, we have produced ratafia in a factory with our own registration.
Malhivern
The name Malhivern comes from the old family cork factory, located in Santa Coloma de Farners, on Sant Sebastià street, in front of the square that bears the same name.
In this workshop, also called the Piton factory, caps of all kinds and calibres were made. From the arrival of the first material, sorting, boiling and preparation of the final caps.
At the beginning of the 20th century, we had a great-grandmother who prepared and gave a bottle of ratafia to each worker as a token of appreciation and brotherhood and to pass a very good winter.
In fact, the name Malhivern comes from years ago, from a great-grandfather who always said “Oh, this winter will be harsh, really harsh” and because of this, they started calling him Malhivern.
