Why Portuguese Wine?
“Let’s just go to Porto now.” After one night in Madrid we decided to visit more of Spain at the end of our trip instead of in the middle and head to Portugal.
Everyone that knows me, and most of our readers know, that I am partial to Portugal and Portuguese wine, and for good reason. Family ties aside; few places in the World of Wine can do what a good Portuguese wine can do.
What can it do and why?…should be everyone’s question.
There are two special things happening here; the land and the indigenous grapes.
There are books written about, what the French call, “Terroir.” People have gone to blows about what it actually means. Once you, if you can, scrape away the emotions and marketing you do get to a truer sense of the word. It should not surprise anyone that if you grow two identical things the same way in two different locations (say an apple) they can, and often do, taste different.
The Terroir of Portugal, especially of the Douro, is unique on this planet. Between the steep slopes of Schist and Granite flows the River Douro (translated from low-Latin to mean “Of Gold”). Growing on those slopes are varietals of grapes, many indigenous to the Douro, that have still not been fully explored by the palate of the Wine World at large. The future of Douro wine is bright.
When most people hear Porto (only bad tourists call the city Oporto) only one wine comes to mind, Port Wine. I do love a Vintage Port! If you have had Port and perhaps didn’t care for it go back and read the multiple previous posts titled “So you think you’ve had Port.” Yet it is the red blends that I am after this trip. With the capacity to bring the drinker both the complexity of deep ripe fruit, elegant tannins, balanced acid, and a formidable, long finish. What many call the holy grail of wine.
Not every Portuguese wine on the shelf will give you that experience. Most bottles that do can fetch a very high price once the word gets out, so I do my research and go to the source. One of my favorite shops (of which I mentioned last year in a post of how important a few key translation words are) always has some of the hardest to find bottles at very good prices.
Next week we will travel into the high Douro, the Alto Douro Superior, nearly untouched by tourists, and continue to explore why the wines here have abilities unique in the World of Wine. Until then; A té logo.
