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Colocado por: Lusowine em Sábado, Agosto 18, 2007 - 02:37 PM GMT
Rich red wines from Portugal
Category: MAINELY WINE NEWS:
Posted by: Bob Rossi
When most people think of Portuguese wines, they undoubtedly think of the famous sweet Port wines of Oporto, which were created by the British in the 17th century when shippers began adding brandy to the casks of wine to ensure the stability of the wine during transport and also to improve flavor. However, as the web site of Signature Imports emphasizes, Portuguese wines other than Port also have important stories behind them, which include indigenous grape varieties, old vines, and a passionate and skilled group of vintners. Portugal has been producing table wines for centuries, and now their dry wines, particularly their reds, are becoming recognized as among the best wines produced anywhere in the world. A number of these wines were poured at a recent tasting at Old Port Wine Merchants in Portland, which featured wines from Signature, an importer of top-quality wines from the Iberian peninsula.
The tasting started out with a number of white wines, two of which -- the 2006 Casa de Vila Verde Vinho Verde and the 2004 João Pires Dry Muscat -- were featured in my recent web posting "Still Time to Drink Summer Wines." But while all of the whites showed very well, it was the reds that really stole the show.
One feature of the tasting was the presence of two sets of red wines from two different producers: Casa de Santar in the Dão region of Portugal, and the Marques de Borba wines from winemaker João Portugal Ramos in the region of Alentejo. In each case, one regular bottling and one reserve bottling was poured.
From Casa de Santar, the first wine tasted was the 2003 Castas de Santar Tinto. This was a very smooth, rich wine with plenty of flavor, and was an excellent buy at $13. Following this was the 2003 Casa de Santar Reserva, a rich red wine with a smoky aroma, which retails for around $20. Aged in new French oak for one year, this wine was still quite tannic, and while drinkable now, it could be expected to age well for a number of years. However, I’m not sure that I’ll give the bottle I bought the chance to do so.
The first of the João Portugal Ramos wines tasted was the 2004 Marques de Borba Tinto. This was a rich, smooth, very fruity wine with a powerful aroma, which is drinking well now. At $11, it was one of the best buys at the tasting. This was followed by the 1999 Marques de Borba Reserva. According to the shop’s proprietor, Jacques de Villier, this is one of the best red wines he has ever had. In fact, the first time he tried it he got so carried away he wound up drinking the entire bottle. I tasted a sample from one bottle that had been open for a day, and one that had just been opened. The newly-opened bottle was certainly quite delicious, but the other bottle revealed that the wine has plenty of life ahead of it. It was still rich and complex, with loads of fruit. At $39, it was by far the priciest bottle at the tasting, but it is a wine that compares favorably to top Bordeaux selling for several times the price and illustrates the quality level Portuguese reds are capable of achieving.
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