The many faces of Portugal

Portugal, to my mind, offers the greatest variety of quality wines at competitive prices anywhere in the world. With more than 250 native grape varieties the diversity is breathtaking. To put this in context, Italy has perhaps 350 native grapes but in a country over three times the size. Grapes are big business in Portugal making up some 35% of agricultural production.

It’s not possible to do justice to Portugal in a short article so I’m going to focus on some of the major wine areas – Vinho Verde, the Douro, Dão, Bairrada and Alentejo and Lisbon.

First to a bit of history. Portugal has long had trading ties to England and the Treaty of Windsor of 1386 and later the Methuen Treaty of 1703 promoted and regulated the Anglo-Portuguese wine trade. From England’s point of view this guaranteed access to wine (mainly port and red Vinho Verde at the time) during the many periods when we were at war with France and French wine was banned or taxed prohibitively.

As in many places, phylloxera devasted Portugal’s wine industry from the 1860s and beyond and the 20^th century saw a long period of low-quality wine by poorly-equipped cooperatives. Despite this,  two highly successful rosé brands were launched in the 1940s – Mateus and Lancers – and at one time Mateus accounted for an astonishing 40% of Portuguese wine production!

With Portugal’s accession to the EU, funds became available to invest in new infrastructure, research programmes and training which fuelled a wine revolution. Many coops closed and new and exciting wines began to be made by young and creative winemakers, targeting export markets. Still wines made from port grapes have become a major focus, as well as ripe reds from regions like the Alentejo and crisp whites from the cooler Vinho Verde area in the northwest.

Vinho Verde

Here the cool Atlantic winds travel up the numerous river valleys bringing rain and cool conditions although further inland in the hills the climate is warmer and drier. Most of the vineyards lie on decomposed granite. Once known as an area for producing red wines, now over 80% is white and best known as Vinho Verde (green wine). Often made from the local grape Loureiro and injected with CO₂ to give some spritz, traditionally Vinho Verdes have often lacked flavour and have come across as somewhat unripe. But as viticultural and winemaking techniques have improved so have the wines and adding CO₂ is the exception rather than the rule.

While Loureiro can be fresh with pleasant, delicate floral notes (Anselmo Mendes’ Muros Antigos is a good example), it is Alvarinho (Albariño in Spain) that is recognised as higher quality and can now be shown on wine labels. Probably the best comes from the sub-region of Monção e Melgaço where it is grown at lower yields and can appear on labels as a single variety. Alvarinho is a very refreshing wine with lemon and honeysuckle notes and flavours of peach, nectarine and sometimes tropical fruits. A good example is Deu-la-Deu – see Recommendations.

The Douro

This is the most productive and renowned wine region in Portugal, traditionally best known for its fortified port wines but now also for its still reds made from the same grapes.  Some 75% of production is red wine.

The official Douro region lies up-river from Porto beyond the Serra do Marão mountains (up to 1400m) in the west which protects it from the Atlantic winds and gives a warm, continental climate ideal for red wine production, with a range of microclimates provided by the river and its tributaries. This is an arid place with temperatures rising to 45C in the summer making irrigation increasingly required. It’s back-breaking work looking after vines on the steep, schist terraces and finding pickers is an ever-greater challenge.

In the same way as port wines, still Douro reds are typically a blend of Touriga Nacional, Touriga Franca, Tinto Roriz (the Tempranillo grape of Rioja) and other minor varieties. Touriga Nacional is a robust, deep coloured, very tannic variety, with high acidity, ripe black fruit flavours and floral notes of violet while Touriga Franca is more medium-bodied with red and black fruits. Fermentation may be in open lagares in the same way as port and maturation is typically in smaller barriques of French oak or, increasingly, in larger, more neutral, oak vessels.

There are many excellent Douro producers and I recommend Quinta de la Rosa which seeks to express its terroir while making full-bodied but fresher wines with less obvious oak. They also make a lighter, more red-fruited version, DouRosa for easy-drinking. See Recommendations.

Dão

The Dão region is located to the south of the Douro and is surrounded by mountains which protect it from the cooler conditions of the west but also the hotter interior, giving a warm Mediterranean climate. Most of the vineyards are on granite at lower altitudes than the Douro although some parts rise to 900m or more.

Here Touriga Nacional and Tinto Roriz again dominate but they are usually blended with Jaen (Mencia in Spain) and Alfrocheiro.  On their own both Jaen and Alfrocheiro produce lighter wines with moderate acidity and low-to-medium tannins and red fruit flavours. In Dão blends they help to  freshen and make the wines more approachable.

Traditionally, producers aimed at maximum extraction of tannins from long maceration (soaking) on the skins and extended maturation in old oak. More recently, shorter maceration and maturation in newer oak has become the norm. Some producers have gone further and are making a virtue out of unoaked Dão, on the basis that Touriga Nacional already has ample tannins and structure. A good example is made by Quinta do Escudial – see Recommended Wines.

Just a word too about an excellent white wine grape from the region – Encruzado. This is a relatively full-bodied variety with floral aromas and citrus and stone fruit flavours. It takes well to barrel fermentation in oak and ageing on its lees and can develop a toasty and nutty complexity over time. Look out for Quinto dos Roques.

Bairrada

South of Dão is Bairrada which stretches from the sea into the mountains up to about 1000m. Much of the region has a maritime climate with high rainfall and some winemakers favour the drier Cantanhede area in the south.  Bairrada is famous for the Baga grape which has high acidity and tannins. While it continues to be used as the key component of Mateus Rosé, when grown at low yields or using old vines it can produce concentrated red wines with strawberry, cherry and plum fruit and a certain spicy quality.

Luis Pato (one of seven producers known as Baga Friends which also includes the renowned Dirk Niepoort) helped drive the modernisation of wine practices in the region and Bairrada now produces some excellent age-worthy wines from Baga made from vines sometimes over 100 years old. Filipa, Luis’s daughter and her husband, William Wouters, describes Baga as like Nebbiolo in a warm vintages and Pinot Noir in a cooler one. Under their mantra “Authentic Wines without Make-up” they offer a range of Bagas from the unoaked fruity Dinamica to the rich Tinto Nossa Calcário, fermented in open lagares followed by 18 months in large oak vessels (pipas as in pipes of port). See Recommendations.

Alentejo

This massive region covers much of SE Portugal down to the Algarve in the south and Spain in the East. It has hot dry summers and consists mainly of plains like the Spanish meseta with the highest hills in the north-east.  Its wide range of soils – granite, schist and limestone – enable many grape varieties to prosper here. The Alentejo’s proximity to Lisbon has helped it become the dominant force in the domestic wine market with some 40% share by volume.

Given its climate, the region is best known for powerful, full-bodied reds made from Aragonez (the local word for Tinta Roriz or Tempranillo) but also for Alicante Bouschet and Trincadeira. The former is one of the few teinturier varieties which means that the flesh of the grape is red. It thus produces wines of deep colour, with high acidity and tannins and red and black fruits with eucalyptus notes.

An excellent way to try Alicante is in the Indigena biological wine from Herdade do Rocim which I first tasted last year on a holiday to Madeira. It’s aged in concrete with fully destemmed grapes and this tones down Alicante’s tannic bite. On the other hand if you’re looking for full-on Alentejo power, try Herdade do Esporão’s Reserva Tinta. A super ripe, full-bodied wine with deep black fruits and strong vanilla/coconut notes from the American and French oak. See Recommendations.

Lisbon

Finally, a note about the region north and south of the capital. Here regional (VR) wines predominate, made from a huge range of Portuguese and international varieties.  Once a producer of cheap wines shipped to Portuguese colonies such as Angola, Lisbon is now the source of very good value and surprisingly good quality wines. One company, Casa Santos Lima, makes 40% of all wine here and they probably produce LB7 which is exclusively made for Majestic. It’s a deeply coloured, very drinkable medium-bodied wine made mainly from Touriga Franca and Castelão. As they say great for barbecues. See Recommendations.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this short trip around Portugal. Perhaps it will encourage you to do your own investigating. I guarantee it will be well worth it!