Exploring the Iberian Peninsula parte dois

Departing Barcelona and the Catalan wine region was bittersweet. During our time there, our group of 25 experienced the country’s natural beauty, wines, food and cultural discoveries along with the gracious hospitality of our hosts and of course the great adventures we experienced. Porto, Vila Nova de Gaia and the Douro Valley were our next stops with a whole new set of adventures and locals awaiting our arrival.

Since formally joining the EU in 1986, Portugal's wine industry has grown and been upgraded several notches both in the vineyard, with newly adopted farming regimens, and in the winery by the acquisition of modern technology and equipment. Over the last decade or so, the international market has discovered the diversity of its vinous culture realizing Portugal is about more than its iconic fortified Port wines from the Douro.

Portugal is Europe’s most westerly country and together with Spain forms the Iberian Peninsula and its Colares DOC situated near Lisbon, is the Continent’s western most growing area. Given the Peninsula's relative geographic isolation from Europe, the varieties found in Portugal are unique and descendants of wild grapes that once thrived in the region. They are part of the Vitis Sylvestris family that is considered the ancestor of Vitis Vinifera (Cabernet, Merlot, Chardonnay, Sangiovese, etc.) found elsewhere in Europe and now adopted internationally.

Portugal is home to diverse vineyard locations and second only to Italy with the number of indigenous varieties grown. The current count of 250 will continue to grow as the field of grape genealogy advances. There are more indigenous grapes per square kilometer in Portugal than any other wine producing country plus an additional 340 international varieties that have found a new home.

Only one-quarter the size of California and 350 miles long, Portugal boasts 1,115 miles of coastline with countless inlets and bays providing an interwoven pattern of distinctive viticultural landscapes, each speaking to their individuality by varying climatic conditions, soil types and varietal composition. And it is said that every square meter of land across the country is part of an officially recognized wine growing area.

Upon arriving in Porto and some freshen-up time at our Hotel Le Monumental, a short walk brought us to FLOW for a “modernistic” interpretation of Portuguese cuisine on the patio with Owner Ricardo Graça Moura and manager Erika Espírito Santo overseeing the evening.

I first met Ricardo on our 2017 visit to Porto before a 7-day cruise on the Douro aboard the AmaVida where we also kicked off the trip with our group of 20 for an opening dinner at FLOW. Both Erika and Ricardo were extremely helpful in planning both the menu and wine choices for the evening. As this was our Porto kick-off dinner, I focused on some unique and seldom seen wines from various growing areas of the country.

We began with a refreshing sparkler and light bites as we settled in for the feast to follow. Our 1st Moment (as each course is referred to in Porto) was gazpacho with sun dried tomato pesto, almonds and stracciatella paired to 2022 Vinho Landcraft Loureiro from Vinho Verde. Loureiro is one of the rarer wines of the Vinho Verde that is dominated by the far more familiar Alvarinho (aka Albariño in the adjacent Rías Baixas region in Galicia, Spain) and worth seeking out.

The 2nd Moment featured Encruzado – another “under-the-radar” white from the Dão region just south of the Douro – paired to a very traditional “Brás” of prawns, leek, egg yolk and crispy sweet potato. This was a beautiful dish to both the eye and palate. Some compare Encruzado with Chardonnay, but I find it far more mineral in character with bright acidity that serves as the perfect partner to a very tasty dish.

Our 3rd Moment was an interesting twist on a more traditional beef dish. A perfectly executed Venison Wellington with cherry sour duxelles, Parma ham, accented with a shitake cream and Armagnac sauce. The 2017 Quinta da Ferradosa Douro Red was a perfect foil to the well-crafted blend of flavors and texture of the dish. A simple pumpkin mi-cuit with ricotta mousse and a 2011 Ferreira Vintage Port were the culmination of our “welcome to Porto” dining experience. All I could say was, “Ricardo, you did it again!”

Day one began early with a stunning drive through super-steep slate hillsides of the Douro. Our first stop was a visit to Wine & Soul with co-proprietor and winemaker Sandra Tavares da Silva, the Douro’s first female winemaker who also serves as chief winemaker at her family’s Chocapalha Estate to the south in the Lisboa area.

Sandra led us on a comprehensive and educational tour of the Lagar room where grapes for their Port wines are traditionally stomped by foot then fermented before transfer to cask for aging and the adjacent area for dry wine production and barrel aging. Our tour culminated with majestic views of the Douro below and the surrounding terraced mountainside vineyards as far as the eye could see.

We then joined Sandra for an in-depth tasting of eight wines that gave us a broad yet detailed view of her portfolio and culminated with a tasing of the estate olive oil as a delightful surprise. Among the highlights of the tasting were three reds that were foot trodden (as with Port) and aged in neutral French oak.

Pintas Red is a blend of 40 indigenous varieties, Quinta da Manoella is a Vinhas Velhas example of 30 different varieties and Pintas Character Red is the product of 30 varieties and 60 to 70-year old vines. We also enjoyed two inspiring whites and an outstanding Manoella 10-year Tawny that exhibited more the character and depth of a 20-year example.

We left Wine & Soul for a short but scenic drive to Quinta de la Rosa where we enjoyed a three-course lunch paired to the estate’s Reserve Red and Reserve White with a Late Bottled Vintage Port for dessert. Lunch was in the barrel cave surrounded by row upon row of traditional “Pipes” (elongated barrels containing 550L or about 60 cases) of Port resting comfortably as the wines were aging. It has long been an English tradition to purchase a Pipe of Port from a child’s birth year to pull from and celebrate the occasion for years to come. Following lunch, we were escorted on a comprehensive tour of the winery where we learned more of its history and the vast range of wines produced.

After returning to Le Monumental, we strolled through the neighborhood to the very traditional Traça for a locally inspired meal. I also met Proprietor Catrina Mendes on our 2017 trip to Porto and a return visit was an automatic choice. I was able to plan our delectable four-course dinner with Catrina and its execution was under the skillful hands of Chef Joelson Borges. We began the meal with creamy ham croquettes, traditional Cecina of beef with tomato and deer carpaccio paired to a 2022 Lobo Vasconcelos from the Alentejo region in the south.

The next dish was roasted, salted cod with baked potato, onion and boiled egg accompanied by a 2021 Vinho Verde – San Joanne Terroir Mineral (Alvarinho). A simple but wonderful dish that spoke of local tastes and traditions. A confit of pork cheeks in a Port wine reduction with mashed cheese then followed along with a 2021 Quinta do Vallado from the Douro. Creamy egg pudding with berry jam paired to a delicious Tawny Reserve was an apt finale to a memorable meal.

Continuing our Porto adventure, we decided to spend day two a bit closer to home. A short ride across the river brought us to Vila Nova de Gaia where the larger Port houses continue to age their wine in their centuries-old “lodges.” Today, smaller producers (such as Wine & Soul and Quinta de la Rosa) are allowed to age their wines at their respective production sites in the Douro Valley.

We first visited the time-honored lodge of Taylor’s where we were treated to an extensive educational tour of the production and aging cellars followed by a Tawny experience. The base wine for Taylor’s is vinified up valley near their various vineyards and then shipped by boat down the Douro to the lodge for aging and ultimate blending. Until the five locks and dams were constructed along the Douro between 1964 and 1971 under the direction of Prime Minister Salazar, this was a treacherous route resulting in the loss of hundreds of workers and thousands of barrels of wine.

After our tour, we were led across the magnificent grounds to a private tasting salon where we sampled five Tawnys: 10-Year, 20-Year, 30-Year, 40-Year and a surprise 50-Year. Although, I had previously tasted older Tawnys from barrel, I had never tasted a 50-year from bottle. This was a unique experience for everyone.

Port wines are fortified with distilled spirits (often called brandy) that serve to stop the fermentation at the desired level of residual sugar and adjust the alcohol content (abv) in a desired range from 18 to 22 percent depending on house style.

This production method is quite tricky and differs greatly from the fermentation of a dry wine that normally proceeds on its own to dryness leaving little or no residual sugar. The Port winemaker's skill and tenacity are called into action throughout fermentation as the precise moment of the desired residual sugar concentration can occur any time of day or night. It is only at that moment when the brandy addition can occur as an hour or two of excess fermentation can make the difference whether the finished wine is acceptable or not.

The production of Tawny Port adds another level of challenge and complexity. While Vintage Port consists of wine from a specific vintage, Tawnys are the product of a complex formula based on blending multiple vintages (by volume) to average the age on the label.

In tasting the five wines from oldest to youngest (a normal progression so the attributes of age are not overshadowed by the tenacity of youth), I was able to understand the development curve with an historical perspective. But when tasting from youngest to oldest, the experience was reversed and I appreciated the growth and development in a more chronological order. Both were outstanding perspectives offering a unique experience for the group.

When our tasting was concluded we walked across the street to The Yeatman Hotel (also a Taylor-Fladgate property) for a buffet lunch paired to several dry wines from Taylor properties. The spectacular view across the Douro to Porto is unforgettable. Our next stop of the day was a visit and private tour of the renowned Cork Museum, and I invited Amorim Cork’s international director of marketing and communications Carlos de Jesus to join us for lunch and discuss the history and future of cork.

The Cork Museum (around the corner from the Yeatman) is part of the eight-museum complex of the World of Wine (WOW) and co-sponsored by Taylor’s and Amorim Cork, the world’s largest producer of wine corks and a broad range of other commercial products from clothing to aerospace and countless others.

Carlos shared little known and often forgotten virtues of cork. Portugal is the world’s largest producer of cork and cork products followed by Spain. Ecologically speaking, cork presents a net negative carbon footprint where the cork oak forests act as “carbon sinks.” One ton of cork produced captures 73 tons of CO2 and one cork stopper captures about 400 grams of CO2.

Cork oaks are harvested every 9 years and live 200 years while sequestering CO2 at every level and all cork products are100% recyclable. The scourge of “corkiness” or “corked” wines (TCA contamination) is largely behind us due to Amorim’s €300 million investment to identify the presence of TCA and develop cutting-edge methods for its removal.

Dinner that night at Ricardo Graça’s second restaurant Mistu was one of the most memorable evenings of our Iberian adventure. In addition to the intriguing family-style menu and wine pairings I was able to plan with Ricardo and Mistu Manager Paulo, we were joined by a newly found friend (through his readership of this column) who had recently relocated from Southern California to Ukraine and is now living just north of Porto.

Dean Medeiros (born in Portugal and emigrated to the U.S. as a child) was a sommelier at a Southern California restaurant when Covid hit and the restaurant was forced to close. His wife Julia is from Ukraine and they decided to relocate to Kiev where Julia’s family lived and resume their work there. They lived a nice life in Kiev with Julia designing clothes and Dean educating sommeliers for work in restaurants.

Just before the war began, Dean was part of a 900-person Zoom call to U.S. passport holders warning them to leave immediately. They moved to their summer house in Portugal where they now reside. The stories related by both Julia and Dean were sobering and at some point, very emotional as our entire group embraced them both.

Our final day in Porto took us back to the Douro Valley and Quinta do Crasto. There, we enjoyed a tour, tasting and lunch on the terrace overlooking the splendid river with Miguel Roquette who represents the fourth generation of his family leading the estate. Although Miguel states, “We will always be Port Producers,” he has led a clear path on the exploration and expansion of both white and red dry table wines beginning with the 1994 vintage.

The estate consists of 340 acres with 186 are planted at a variety of altitudes (up to 500 meters) and exposures. The soils are primarily slate where a broad range of red varieties of varying ages grow, and the upper ridge of granite best suited to white varieties for the table wine programs. In addition, Crasto owns a 375 acre estate with 285 planted at altitudes from 130 to 450 meters in the Douro Superior region.

Our visit began near the main house where Miguel explained the history of the property dating back to Roman time. Their strategic fort at the top of the mountain with a 360-degree view of the river allowed them to track all traffic from any direction. An exhilarating hike through and around the steep rocky and slate vineyard gave us an understanding of the land and grape growing challenges.

We gathered around the infinity pool with sweeping views of the Douro Valley for small bites and a taste of three dry wines from magnum before adjourning to the terrace for a delightful lunch served both family-style and buffet with additional wines from Miguel’s portfolio and library.

We began with a 2019 Crasto Douro Superior Red and a surprise 2020 Crasto Superior Syrah from an experimental plot on the Douro Superior vineyard. Despite the heat in that area, this Syrah was more in the style of a Northern Rhone with bright acidity, a generous dose of red berries and the characteristic “bacon-fat” notes on the nose.

We continued our vinous adventure with a 2005 Quinta do Crasto Reserva Old Vines. As a pièce de resistance we were treated to a 2006 Vina Maria Teresa in a 3.0L format from Miguel’s personal cellar. This rare wine is sourced from an exclusive small plot of centenary vines and is one of Quinta do Crasto’s oldest. What a delight! We finished the meal with a Late Bottled Vintage Port from the early 1990s and a 1987 Vintage Port. A beautiful finale to a magnificent day.

Our arrival in Porto was followed by some down time before walking through town for our closing dinner at Real at Casa da Calcada. During the planning process both Luis Moreira and Mariana Pinheiro were most helpful and the entire Real staff offered superb service during the dinner. As this was our closing dinner, I wanted to expand our experience by focusing on wines from areas we had not previously experienced.

Before being seated, we began with a creative selection of canapes and 2022 Portal da Calçada Vinho Verde in magnum. Our 1st Moment was a delicate seabass rice with seaweed and Salicornia paired to a lively 2020 Campolargo Bical de Sempre from Bairrada. Next, we were treated to sauteed chicken with aromatic herbs and seasonal vegetables paired to 2022 Paxá Negre from the Algarve region.

Our 3rd Moment featured a Sous vide black pork (from Alentejo and a local delicacy) with smoked corn and Portuguese cabbage. The pairing wine for this course was rare and not often seen in export markets: 2019 Quinta dos Távores Reserva Vinhas Velhas from Trás-os-Montes in Portugal’s northeast mountains.

Dessert was a traditional Portuguese pudding with egg yolks, sugar, lard and Port wine. To match the dish, I wanted to feature the classic wine of the coastal Setúbal region: 2004 Horácio Simõnes Moscatel Roxo. A very sweet ending for a magnificent culinary experience!

The Iberian Peninsula was a land of boundless surprises expressed through the individual personalities of Spain and Portugal. We await the opportunity of revisiting the area and continuing our exploration of her wines, cuisine and culture. Saúde!