From Wine Folly:
“Because Portugal’s wine culture developed in relative isolation, many grape varieties do not grow anywhere else in the world. If you don’t recognize the grape variety on a Portuguese wine label, it’s a good thing. There are over 250 indigenous varieties and a few imports (including Alicante Bouschet) that have adapted well to the Portuguese landscape (i.e., they are delicious). To many wine experts, Portugal is the last frontier of wine in Western Europe; there is still so much to be tasted and explored. With all the excitement Portugal offers, let’s look at the major wines and regions.”
Portugal enjoys an enviable position in southwestern Europe. Its continental coastline stretches over 800 km from north to south. Tourism is booming and it is no wonder. The scenery is stunning, the food is delicious, and the wines are better than everAlgarve, allows over 250 different indigenous grapes to prosper. Vineyards span the country, from its vast plains to rugged, mountainous terrains.
In the past, Portugal was best known for its Porto and bold red wines. Today, lighter, fresher wine styles are generating equal buzz, with a notable spotlight on elegant sparkling wines and serious dry whites.
From Wine Folly:
“Quality Levels of Portuguese Wine
Portugal wine classifications and quality levels by Wine Folly.
There are 3 levels of wine quality in Portugal. You can identify them by looking at the wine label.
DOC (or DOP): DOC stands for Denominação de Origem Controlada and means the wine comes from a strictly defined geographical area with recommended and permitted grapes and maximum vine yields (to control quality). Technically there are 31 DOCs in Portugal, although 3 of them overlap, making it seem more like 28.
Vinho Regional (or IGP): The entirety of Portugal is divided into 14 regional wine (“vinho regional”) areas that have less strict rules for controlling which types of grapes are used as well as maximum vine yields. While this implies that the wines will not be as high quality, many creative and pioneering producers in Portugal use the Vinho Regional designation to create excellent wines using grapes or blends not allowed in DOC.
Vinho (Wine): This is the most basic classification of Portuguese table wine. Chances are you won’t see this outside of Portugal.
The Comissão Vitivinícola Regional (CVR) is a “Wine and Vine” commission governing across the country. Each CVR regulates to ensure quality and to maintain each region’s character. Because water is a problem in Portugal, the CVR also carefully monitors the granting of permissions for irrigation.”
Wine Production by Region
Douro e Porto
The steep, terraced vineyards of the Douro Valley follow the sinuous path of the Douro River from the Spanish border, gradually flattening as they near the city of Porto. The climate is hot and dry, protected from wet coastal weather by the Serra do Marão mountains. Native Portuguese red grapes TintaBarroca, Tinta Roriz, Tinto Cão, Touriga Franca, and Touriga Nacional thrive here. These are the favoured varieties in the Douro’s famous fortified Port wines and its bold, dry reds. A small, but increasingly exciting quantity of premium white wine is also made here from local grapes Gouveio, Malvasia Fina, Moscatel, Rabigato and Viosinho.
Lisboa
The vineyards of Lisboa are located to the north and west of Lisbon. A wide variety of sparkling, white, rosé,and red wines are produced here. Fresher, lighter styles are produced close to the Atlantic coast, while the warmer interior, shielded by the Serra de Montejunto hills, yields bolder wines. Colares is a reputed red wine sub-region, located near Lisboa’s southwestern tip. The area’s sandy soils prevent Phylloxera infestations allowing for ungraftedvines of the local Ramisco variety. Its wines are robust
and tannic. The region’s most famous red wines come from Alenquer, which has established a reputation for complex, full-bodied wines made from Touriga Nacional and Tinto Roriz (Tempranillo). The most celebrated white wines come from Bucelas, which is known for its fresh, minerally white wines made from Arinto that can gain complexity after 2-3 years of aging. Bucelas is a small, historic area located just 25 kilometers north of Lisbon’s central Baixa district.
Vinho Verde
Traditionally, the Minho region of northern Portugal produces light, crisp, low alcohol, subtly sparkling wines with a whisper of residual sugar. Most are white wines (aka Vinho Branco), made from a blend of local grapes in an unoaked, early drinking style.
More recently, Vinho Verde winemakers have begun experimenting with dry, still, single variety wines. These fresh newwhites offer a fascinating opportunity to discover the varietal character of the region’s star varieties: Alvarinho, Arinto, Loureiro, and Trajadura.
Most Vinho Verdes are crisp and citrusy, and most are a bit effervescent, as you described, because winemakers often add a dose of carbon dioxide right before bottling. Vinho Verdes are usually inexpensive and typically go great with seafood.
Top Wines From this region:
- Casal Garcia Vinho Verde. Portugal. 530261.
- Aveleda Fonte 2019, Doc Vinho Verde. Vinho Verde, Portugal. 5322.
- Curvos Loureiro 2022, Doc Vinho Verde. Vinho Verde, Portugal. 471284.
- Alianca Vinho Verde 2018. Vinho Verde, Portugal. 75663.
- Gatao Vinho Verde 2011. Vinho Verde, Portugal. 204503.
Dao
The mountainous region of Dão sits to the southwest of the Douro. The area is sheltered from the extremes of both continental and maritime weather patterns, giving it a temperate climate. Like the Douro, the Dão takes its name from the river that traverses its vineyards. Touriga Nacional is the reigning red grape here, often blended with Tinta Roriz. The Dão’s more moderate climate and higher proportion of granite soil give a slightly fresher, more mineral-laced quality to these red blends as compared to the Douro. Excellent reds are also being made from the region’s Alfrocheiro and Jaen varieties.
M.O.B.
The M.O.B. label stands for Moreira, Olazabal and Ferreira, three great names in Portuguese winemaking who got together to launch a wine project in the Dão region. The bottle shown here, under the Senna label, is their premium red, costing €27.95, made from a blend of Touriga Nacional, Alfrocheiro and Jaen grapes. This is a wine of seductive complexity, floral and berry fruit notes on the nose, medium bodied with great freshness in the mouth. Costing considerably less is M.O.B. Lote 3 at around €10, representing outstanding value for money.
Bella Sauvignon Blanc
The Bella winery is part of Ideal Drinks, the winemaking project of a very wealthy Portuguese businessman who sold his Swiss watch brand some years ago and started investing heavily in Portugal, specifically in wine.
I reviewed the range of Bella wines in these pages recently; this white, along with a red and a rosé, both from the Pinot Noir grape. They are all excellent, but the Sauvignon Blanc stands out as what is possibly the best Portuguese Sauvignon Blanc on the market with aromas of freshly-cut grass and honey melon on the nose. Not cheap at around €20 but worth every cent.
Quintas das Marias Encruzado
One of many excellent Dão whites made from the Encruzado grape. Encruzado is to Dão what Chardonnay is to Burgundy, producing everything from fresh and zesty everyday whites to sophisticated oaked wines of body and character. In fact, good Encruzado is often compared by sommeliers here in Portugal to Chablis and even to Meursault. Quinta das Marias is the project of the Eckert family from Germany, who bought a farm near Viseu in the early 90s. This is their unoaked version of Encruzado, a wine that is aged on the fine lees for four months, with batonnage adding complexity and some body. White fruit and mineral notes predominate on the nose with the solid acidity that is typical of Encruzado adding to great freshness in the mouth. A true expression of the variety. Priced at €14.49.
Taboadella Alfrocheiro
A fairly recent project on a very old farm that dates back to Roman times and takes its name from nearby Roman ruins. The Taboadella winery produces some outstanding blends but is perhaps best known for its varietal wines championing the traditional Dão grapes such as this Alfrocheiro. Rubi red in colour, black berry fruits come to the front along with pine and hints of spice; very well integrated oak. The wine is medium-to-full-bodied in the mouth with well-rounded tannins and a smooth, dry finish. Priced at €18.95.
By Patrick Stuart
patrick.stuart@open-media.ne
Bairrada
The coastal plains of Bairrada have a mild, fairly rainy climate. The vineyards grow on clay-limestone soils in certain areas and on sandy soils elsewhere giving quite different wine styles – more ample and tannic on the former, silkier and lighter on the latter. The major red grape of Bairrada is Baga. This thinskinned, late ripening variety yields red wines of vibrant freshness, medium body, and perfumed notes of wild berries and plum. Bairrada is also a revered terroir for sparkling wines in Portugal.
Bairrada produces mainly table, white, and red wines, and the region has a few principal grape varieties including red casts Baga, Alfrocheiro, Camarate, Castelão, Jaen, Touriga Nacional, Aragonez; and white casts Maria Gomes, Arinto, Bical, Cercial, Rabo de Ovelha, Verdelho.
Alentejo & Tejo
These hot, dry regions represent more than one-third of Portugal’s total surface area. Due to their varied topography and multitude of different soil types, each of these areas is sub-divided into a handful of winemaking sub-regions. Alentejo, which means “beyond the Tejo” (river), is theheartland of Portugal’s red wine production. Major
grapes include: Alfrocheiro, Alicante Bouschet, Aragonez, Castelão, and Trincadeira. It is difficult to generalize given the region’s wide diversity, but rich, velvety, ripe-fruited red wines are common.
The Islands
Located over 1000 kilometres from the mainland, it is easy to forget that the Madeira archipelago and the Azores are part of Portugal’s vibrant wine scene. Madeira is famous for its complex, long-lived fortified wines. The volcanic soils and marine breezes of the Azores give a distinctive salinity to its crisp white an
All along, the wineries on the Portuguese islands of the Azores were never just places that made wine. They were social gathering spots, where the owners would invite their friends and families over to drink wine, eat meals, and sometimes sleep if they didn’t feel like going home after the wine and the meals.
And so when the partners in the Azores Wine Company set out to create their winery on the island of Pico, they followed that tradition, which was established centuries ago, almost as soon as the Portuguese discovered the previously uninhabited islands. Theirs would be a winery and then some, with rooms for overnight stays, a long table for meals shared between friends and a welcoming tasting room.
Expectations were high, because the Azores Wine Company is one of the most well regarded projects in Portugal. Founded in 2014 by winemaker António Maçanita, gourmet festival founder and tourism school director Filipe Rocha and Pico native and winemaker Paulo Machado, the company essentially put Azores wines on the contemporary map. Straight out of the gate, their wines won a slew of distinctions. The grapes they produced became the most expensive in Portugal (understandably, given the difficult growing conditions and the very high quality), on par with Champagne, Bordeaux and Napa Valley grapes. So they couldn’t built just any winery. It had to be special.
Article references:
- Wine Folly.
- The Diverse World of Portuguese Wines by Jackson Blisson MW.
- Wines From Dao Patrick Stewart
- Forbes Ann Abel