This lovely red Douro reserva combines the dense, healthy fruit typical of the area with a well-polished structure that can only be achieved when the grape material is at its best, the winery as well and the winemaker in control.
You therefore do not need to store this wine, as the tannins are so rounded that you are guaranteed a wonderful drinking experience already now.
The grapes are a trio consisting of regulars from port wine production; touriga nacional, tinta roríz and touriga franca. They are harvested from low-yielding, old vines at perfect maturity from the slate-covered hillsides in the heart of the Pinhão Valley, which contains the region’s best fields.
Quinta do Portal has its home in the same place, and here they have invested a large pile of money in a modern winery built into a mountainside, so, among other things, the cellar stays cool all year round.
After fermentation, the wine spent nine months in French oak, which has rounded off the wine and contributed extra complexity and gentle tannins to the finished wine.
The expression in the wine is both fruity, densely packed but also refined and complex. The juiciness of dark berry fruit blends elegantly with the wine’s minerality and the cedar and espresso notes that come from barrel aging.
The intensity is high without being overbearing or saturating, and overall this is just one of those well-balanced wines, it’s hard to get really mad at. This is wine with personality that can be enjoyed both now and for at least a decade to come.
Serve slightly below room temperature at 15-18°, preferably in spacious burgundy glasses.
