Duas Quintas - affordable Douro

Ramos Pinot's Duas Quintas has been around a while and predates many of the new wave reds from Portugal's Douro. The partner red, the Reserva, is usually up there with the best from the region; the much cheaper regular Duas Quintas, which I'm trying here, is usually reliable and affordable, if a little unspectacular.

Duas Quintas has had a bit of a face-lift. It boasts a new label, and the wine has changed a bit - much more modern and fruit forward, with nice purity. Is this the vintage, or a style change? I reckon this delivers (even at the slightly inflated Nicolas pricing) and is a good introduction to what the Douro is capable of, even in a less celebrated vintage.

Duas Quintas 2006 Douro, Portugal

Lovely vivid pure sweet raspberry and blackberry fruit dominates here, and it flirts with jamminess. The palate has nicely dense berryish fruit with an attractive spicy edge and some chocolatey richness. It's quite pure with nice balance between the primary fruit and some spicy tannins. 88/100 (Nicolas £9.15)

Krispy Kreme and the Douro

Went to the fifth day of the Lord's test today.

After having been on Thursday for the first day, I was looking at the rate of subsequent play with great attentiveness. That's because test matches have five days scheduled for play, but because the scoring rate is higher than it used to be, most tests are now finished within four days, and it's rare to have much play on the fifth. As a result, no tickets are sold in advance for the final day's play (it's pay on the gate, £20 for adults, £10 for kids), and box holders for Sunday get to keep their boxes for Monday as a bonus. Which is why I was attending today, as guest of Douro producer Quinta de la Rosa - not the normal sort of corporate hospitality gig. Also present in the box from the wine trade were Tim French of Fortnum & Mason, Hamish Anderson of the Tate group and Charles Metcalfe.

Anyway, the game was nicely poised at the start of play, with South Africa trailing by 100 runs but with nine wickets in hand. It was going to be very exciting (if England got some early wickets), or very boring (if South Africa managed to bat through a few sessions unscathed). In the end, it was the latter. I love test cricket, but I'll admit that when games fizzle into a damp squib of a draw like this, it's enough to make you rush out and buy tickets to see some 20:20 fireworks.

England's bowlers struggled to trouble South Africa on a pitch that made batting look quite easy. Still, we had a very enjoyable day. Some Quinta de la Rosa wines were sampled. The 2006 Quinta de la Rosa is deliciously fresh and aromatic with vibrant dark cherry fruit and more than a hint of seriousness. 2005 Passagem, from their new property in the Douro Superior, is a serious effort with lush, sweet, pure fruit backed up by some spicy structure. I really liked this ripe but focused and balanced wine. The 2004 Reserva is evolving nicely with lovely purity of fruit. And I found out that the 1997 Colheita goes pretty well with Krispy Kreme donuts. Especially the one with a bit of jam in the middle.

Krispy Kreme donuts look evil and I should hate them, but I find them thoroughly addictive. I was first introduced to them by my older son, who was already hooked at the time: I bought him one at the KK outlet in Bentalls in Kingston, and then found out that the coffee I'd ordered came with two free KK donuts. They looked appalling but tasted delicious, in much the same way that Pringles do. And now I have found they work with Colheita, which is a bit of a bonus.

A rainy Guimaraes and some old wine with Dirk

Yesterday was appallingly wet. It rained and rained, and then rained some more. There were sheets of rain, and then there was drizzle, and then the clouds were so low they were at street level, and then the sheets of rain started again. So we hopped in the car and drove through Porto, past the impressive, compact FC Porto stadium and out the other side, heading for Guimaraes, the ancient capital of Portugal (above).

Portuguese drivers have a bad reputation, and there were a few hairy moments with crazy drivers on the motorway, but we got there safely. It was even wetter in Guimaraes, but that didn't spoil the beauty of this old town. We walked up to the beautifully preserved castle, where you can walk round the ramparts, as long as you have a head for heights (no guard rail here, as you can see in the picture below). Then we lunched well and cheaply on some typically Portuguese fare. I ordered a 25 cl jug of house red, and it was utterly fantastic - and just E1.25. It was a red Vinho Verde: amazingly bright red/purple in colour, with a bit of spritz and lovely vibrant, forward fruit. The acidity was really high, but in combination with the fruit this made it a brilliantly refreshing drop.

Then we were off to Dirk Niepoort's for dinner. It was brave of him to invite all four of us over. We were joined by Niepoort general manager José Teles and winemaker Luis Seabra. Time for a cellar raid. Dirk told me and Luis to pick something interesting, but he retained the right to veto. His cellar has a lot of Riesling, white Burgundy, red Burgundy (including a couple of rows of DRC), a bit of Rhone, quite a bit of Bordeaux and lots of old Portuguese bottles, as well as plenty of Port and Madeira.

So what did we drink?

Billaud Simon Chablis Grand Cru Vaudesir 2002
Fine, bready and minerally, this is fresh and bright yet rich and deep at the same time. Quite serious. 92/100

Bernard Van Berg Le Vin Le Plus Simplement 2005 Bourgogne Grand Ordinaire
This red Burgundy shows what you can do with a lowly terroir and yields of just 18 hl/ha. It's quite reductive (burnt match) along with vibrant red berry fruit. It's fresh and quite elegant with freshness and nice depth of fruit and a bit of meatiness. Very stylish for this appellation, and with a few years in bottle should shed its reductive youth and turn out very nice. 90/100

Caves S. Joao Reserva Particular 1959 Portugal
This old bottle is a blend of fruit from Bairrada and Dao. A deep colour with some brown hints, this has a wonderfully aromatic nose that is dark and meaty with a lovely spiciness. There's old wine complexity here, but it is still really alive, with bloody, iron-like notes in the background. There's also a bit of herby undergrowth character. Brilliant old wine. 94/100

Chapoutier Hermitage 1978
Very fresh and complex with minty, herby notes emerging, as well as some dark fruit character. This an appealing wine with brightness and elegance to the fore. It's not a big, heavy wine, but instead shows a precise, well focused personality, and you get the feeling that this has still got a bit more to give. 93/100

Niepoort Pinot Noir 2006 Douro
Still in cask, soon to be bottled. This is from the highest, coolest Niepoort vineyards, and this year Luis Seabra said he cut his holidays short to pick on the 24th August, to keep the wine fresh. It certainly is fresh, with bright, ripe red fruit character and a bit of mintiness. There's some elegance and nice texture, with hints of vanilla oak on the finish. This is actually pretty stylish. 89-93/100

Robustus 2004 Douro
Robustus was the name of Dirk's first table wine, made in 1990 (for more, see here). This new Robustus is a wine made repeating many of the 'mistakes' Dirk made back in 1990, and it's fabulous. It's half Redoma, half Batuta fruit, bottled after four years in wood. Deep coloured, it has a fresh, pure dark fruits nose that leads to a focused palate with elegant fruit and some oak imprint. There's brilliant freshness here with good tannins. It's quite firm with lovely freshness and density. Serious stuff. 'Not a modern, fruit-driven, square wine', says Dirk. Just four 1200 litre barrels made. 94/100

Niepoort 1963 Vintage Port
We tasted this blind. The others were in the 1970s; I was in the 1960s but got no closer. It's mature, super-elegant, spicy and a bit floral. There's nice freshness here as well as a seamless texture. Almost perfect balance: this isn't a big, heavy wine at all. 95/100

Lord of the rings, and more wine

As I think I've mentioned here before, our boys are adopted. They're brothers, and they have two sisters who are also adopted with another couple. We get together a couple of times a year, home and away, and it's usually good fun.

This weekend we're here in London, and we thought it might be nice to go to the theatre. So we booked tickets for Lord of the Rings. I'm not a huge fan of musicals - lots of songs and dancing and all that. But it was actually fantastically creative, although our younger son didn't get the concept: 'That was so fake', he said at the end. The set and lighting were utterly incredible, and the way that this complicated, action-packed plot was dealt with on one stage was imaginative and totally memorable.

It was long, though, and I fell asleep during one of the fight scenes, but then I was up late last night watching Peep Show and the Mighty Boosh, so I was quite tired. My bad.

Tonight, we're trying a few wines. The De Bortoli Shiraz Viognier 2004 is even better than last night, showing lovely focus and dark peppery fruit, although there is a hint of greenness - I guess the challenge is to get 'old world' focus and freshness by picking earlier, but then to avoid overt greenness.

A real hit for me is the Churchill Estates 2006 Douro, which is fresh with lovely dark, plummy fruit. It has a slightly bitter plummy tang on the palate, but it really tastes of the Douro, which is a good thing. If you want an introduction to Douro reds, Churchill's is one of the few inexpensive examples that actually show some of the genuine Douro character.

Secano Estate Pinot Noir 2007 Leyda Valley, Chile is remarkably fresh, expressive cool-climate Pinot, with herby, slightly green, slightly reductive cherryish fruit. There's some plumminess here. It's just a little too green and reductive for me, but it is deliciously well defined and fresh. Promising, but there is still some work to do here.

A brace of Portuguese reds

Two Portuguese reds this evening. Different regions - the Douro and Alentejo - but sharing the same rather elegant font face for the name on the label (was the same designer employed?). As an aside, over the last few days I've been decanting all the reds I've been drinking. It seems to have worked quite well, and it's something I might be doing more of. Must get an early night tonight: I'm playing golf first thing tomorrow.

Malhadinha Nova Monte da Peceguina 2006 Vinho Rehional Alentejano, Portugal
I'm enjoying this new wave Alentejo red, but there's just something about the finish that I'm not totally sure about. Deep coloured, it shows ripe, rather meaty but otherwise pure blackcurrant and raspberry fruit. It's really engaging, with good concentration. The palate has a nice freshness to it with - rather higher acidity than you might expect from such a ripe wine - and a finish that has a bit of a prickle to it. Is this a hint of Brettanomyces? It's really hard to say. But it stops what would otherwise be an excellent wine from being quite as good as it might have been. 89/100

Quinta Nova de Nossa Senhora do Carmo Grande Reserva 2005 Douro, Portugal
This is a concentrated, tight wound, rather classy Douro red with vibrant red and black fruits ensheathed by lots of creamy, vanilla new oak that adds a sweet sheen to the otherwise quite savoury, high acid character on the palate. There's a hint of austerity to the tannic structure, which, combined with the acidity gives a savouriness to the wine. An ambitious wine that may well develop in interesting ways, but at the moment the oak and the fruit aren't working completely in harmony. But what I do like is the aromatic plummy, herby character on the nose, that's almost Burgundian in poise. Maybe a day in the decanter might help. 90/100

Tasting Portugal's best

Each year, a journalist gets asked to pick what they consider to be Portugal's 50 top wines, which are then used as the basis for a tasting held each February at the Portuguese Embassy. It's a popular event that's usually full to bursting. So far, Richard Mayson, Tim Atkin and Charles Metcalfe have done the honours; this year the job has fallen to Simon Woods.

Because he's an all-round nice chap, Simon invited a few of his journalist chums to join him in tasting through the pre-selection samples. It turns out I was the only one able to take up this generous offer, and so I spent an enjoyable few hours with him yesterday afternoon and this morning, steadily working through over a hundred wines from all the major Portuguese regions.

The wines turned out to be a little mixed. As you might expect, the Douro put in a strong showing, although I wonder whether 2005 is quite the vintage some people reckon it is. While the 2005s looked good at the New Douro tasting last month, they didn't look as good today. Perhaps just a little too warm in the Douro during the 2005 growing season?

The whites (from all regions) showed strongly. Yes, it was a small group, but Portuguese whites are getting better and better. However, the reds from Estremadura and Ribatejo struggled a bit. Some good wines, but no great ones. Many average bottles.

The selection from Dao was small but good, with the various wines from Alvaro Castro leading the way, followed by a couple from Sogrape. We had a few nice Bairrada wines, but all were labelled 'Beiras', rather than using the Bairrada appellation itself.

The Alentejo reds were pretty good in a ripe, modern style. Again, 2005 seems quite a warm vintage, in what is already a warm-climate region. As an aside, the Douro and Alentejo together account for the majority of Portugal's top wines, I reckon.

A really good, affordable Douro red

Respected Port house Quinta do Noval came relatively late to the Douro table wine revolution, but they arrived with a splash when they released their inaugural 2004 wines last year (see my earlier report here). Tonight I revisted one of these wines: the 2004 Cedro do Noval. It's just a really good wine, and if the Douro can make more wines of this sort of quality at this sort of price (retail = £10), then its future as one of the world's great wine-growing districts is assured. It tastes of the Douro, I reckon - although it's clearly an impossible (an undesirable) task imposing a single Douro style on all of its red wines.

Cedro do Noval 2004 Douro, Portugal
This Douro table wine is one of the best-value examples of this genre around, and I reckon it can compete effectively with many of its more expensive peers. The nose is complex with dark cherry fruit and some spicy, minerally depth. It’s ripe and sweet, but savoury and balanced at the same time. The palate has some savoury tannic structure, some ripe cherry fruit and a pleasant plummy bitterness. Good acidity keeps it fresh. An appealing, dense, savoury wine that displays some warm-climate ripeness allied with old-world savouriness. 91/100 (c. £10 retail)

New Douro 2005...the best yet!

Went to a very enjoyable tasting held at the spectacular East Room, on the 7th floor of the Tate Modern today. It was the third installment of the New Douro, a collaborative effort including 18 of the top table wine producers in the Douro, and this year we were looking at wines from the 2005 vintage.

If I were to single out particular wines in this brief post it would be a little unfair, because the overall quality was uniformly high, but I'm going to do it anyway. First, a couple of general comments. 2005 isn't a perfect vintage, but it comes closer than most. It was perhaps just a touch too dry and too warm, but that's being fussy. Apparently 2007 is looking like an utterly incredible vintage: everyone I spoke to was thrilled by it. But let's not take attention away from 2005, because the average quality is very high.

One of the most exciting things about today's tasting was that there seem to be a real diversity of styles emerging with these Douro table wines - more so than was evident before. Producers seem to be finding their feet, and getting to grips with what effectively is a brand new region in terms of table wine production. It's very hard to say what Douro 'terroir' tastes like in terms of wines. The diversity of microclimates through the various valleys along the Douro, coupled with different approaches to winemaking, seems to make for a range of different styles.

So, some standouts. Niepoort Charme 05 is fantastic, as is Vale Meao 05. Crasto and Vallado both have thrilling Touriga Nacionals. La Rosa's Cerejinha and Vale do Inferno (single vineyard wines) are utterly lovely, Poeria 05 is the best yet and one of the wines of the tasting, Christiano van Zeller's CV 05 is great, and Pintas 05 is top-notch. (Pictured above is Sandra Tavares of Pintas showing off her wine; below is the lovely new label of La Rosa's Cerejinha.)

Tasting the Douro

I'm preparing for tomorrow's New Douro 2005 tasting by drinking some Douro wine. Specifically, tonight's drinking involves a pair of 05s from a Quinta I've no previous experience with, Quinta Nova de Nossa Senhora do Carmo. With a snappy title like that, I guess they like to be referred to as Quinta Nova, although that's confusingly close to Quinta do Noval.

Nova is owned by the Amorim family of cork fame. They have a highly regarded wine hotel at the Quinta. And the wines seem to be made in the right sort of style, tasting of the Douro (or, at least, what I expect the Douro to taste like), without being tricked-up by over-ripeness or too much oak. The packaging is absolutely stunning.

Quinta Nova 'Grainha' 2005 Douro
Very attractively packaged, this relatively modestly priced Douro red has a deep red/purple colour. The nose shows berry and dark cherry fruit with a bit of spice and tar, and leads to a savoury, spicy, quite structured palate with a hint of plummy bitterness on the finish, and just the slightest hint of vanilla sweetness. It's an attractive food friendly wine for drinking now and over the next decade. I like the savouriness. 88/100

Quinta Nova Reserva 2005 Douro
Aromatically fresh and vibrant, this has a really attractive nose of dark cherries, herbs and spices. The palate is really lively, with some classy oak supporting the bright berry and cherry fruit. With nice grippy tannin and fresh acidity, this is a really elegant expression of the Douro that should evolve really nicely for at least a decade. It's almost Bordeaux-like in terms of its structure, if not its flavour profile, which is warmer and spicier. I'd be really interested to see how this wine develops - I reckon it will age well. 91/100

Douro Boys Cuvee 2005

The Douro Boys - a coalition of five of the leading Douro table wine-producing quintas - have announced that they'll be releasing a special cuvee from the 2005 vintage. Dubbed 'Douro Boys Cuvee 2005', it's a blend of selected barrels from all five producers: Niepoort, Crasto, Vallado, Vale de Meao and Vale Dona Maria. (See: http://www.douroboys.com/ for more details)

What is especially intriguing about this initiative is that the wine was bottled only in magnum, and just 500 will be released, all of which will be sold in a special auction:

"Only 500 Magnum bottles of this very special wine will be offered, and in a very individual way. They will be auctioned on Friday, 30th of November in the Douro Valley at an event hosted by Peter Mansell, Associate Director of Christie’s International Wine Department.

The 500 Magnums are divided into 30 different lots, ranging from 1 single Magnum up to a group of 60 Magnums, and many of the lots come with an 'additional and personal bonus' courtesy of each Douro Boy, these include a surfing Lesson with Miguel Roquette, dinner prepared by Dirk Niepoort, a golfing day with Vito Olazabal… even a football match against a Douro Boys team! There will be many wonderful items encompassing boat rides, delicious meals and overnight stays at the most beautiful locations in the Douro Valley."

Flickr rocks!

I've been playing with flickr, and as someone here commented a while back, it's quite addictive. I've now shelled out US$24.95 on a year's subscription to the Pro version, and have been busy uploading pictures onto my page. There's a nifty uploading tool called 'Flickr Uploadr', which is recommended.

I've now got all my Douro pictures online, a collection that numbers 245. There's also a collection of 'wine people', which I've shared with a group of the same name set up by Jim Budd. It's a great utility, and I'll be adding more pics over the coming weeks. There must be a way of integrating the flickr pictures with my website. I need to explore.

Fortnum and Mason

This afternoon I met with Tim French, wine buyer for upmarket London department store Fortnum and Mason. Tim, who comes across as young, articulate and smart, has been redeveloping Fortnum's house wines. Rather than them occupy the bottom rung in the Fortnum's offering, they are sourced from prestigious producers and then slotted into the upper-middle segment of the range, with the producer's identity made clear on the label.

'I've tried to put myself in the consumers' place', says French. 'When you come to Fortnum and Mason, you want quality and authenticity. Customers are largely buying our reputation and expertise'. When he chooses wines for own-label, French says he is 'looking for the most authentic example of an appellation or terroir'. He adds that, 'we are working with producers that stand out among their peers'.

The reason I was meeting with him is because I'm going to be writing an article on his new Port range, which comes from Dirk Niepoort. 'Port is such an important category for us', says French. 'Of all my own label challenges, one of the most important was to get the Port right'. When deciding on a supplier, he began with the LBV. He had some 40 wines open and tasted through them. Of them all, the Niepoort wine stood out. He's gone on to develop a range of five Ports and one Douro table wine from Niepoort, which we tasted together.

In brief:

1) Dry white Port: quite complex, fresh and moreish, and a bargain at £10.50

2) Douro 2005 table wine: this is the Vertente, and it's really good. French says, 'It's a style of wine that in many ways a Claret drinker would be familiar with, but it has modernity, too. For the traditional drinker it's a new experience in comfortable surroundings'. I agree. £14.50

3) LBV 2001: a mini-Vintage Port. Delicious. £13.50

4) Vintage Port 1997: this is stock left from Passadouro. Concentrated, smooth and intense, with a silky, layered palate. Serious. A bargain. £27.50

5) 10 Year Old Tawny: A brilliant balance between youth and development. Lovely delicacy and aromatics. 'I love the play of savoury and sweetness', says French. Finish is eternal. £22.50

6) Colheita 1991. Profound. Complex, spellbinding, with a lovely elegant soft texture, with subtelty and finesse. 'This whispers to you', says French. 'It's just so interesting'. £35

Footnote: Fortnum's wine bar allows customers to drink anything from the shop with a £10 corkage. From October, they will be open until 11 pm. Anyone fancy some serious drinking, with food?

Rain and a Douro quiz

It's raining again, today. I can't beleive it. And of the next 10 days, only one is forecast to be dry. Where has our summer gone?

This time last year it was hot and sunny. Fiona and I went to the Douro for the Quinta de la Rosa centenary celebrations. Pictured is the boat ride we took down river, on a swelteringly hot day. Wish I was there now, actually.

See if you can recognize the two characters at the centre of this picture doing a bit of Quinta spotting. Click picture to get a bigger one.

Deadlines and inexpensive Portuguese

If you fancy being a winewriter - or a writer of any kind, for that matter - one of the things you have to learn to live with, and be ruled by, is the deadline. I've always had a simple attitude to deadlines, and it goes something like this. You keep them. While it may not seem very rock 'n roll, and it makes me sound like the smug kid who always handed his homework in on time, I realise that I need editors more than they need me, so I'll do all I can to keep them happy. Along those lines I try never to renegotiate deadlines (which is pretty much the same as not meeting them) unless absolutely necessary. I don't know whether my fellow winewriters feel the same; I don't really want to know, because sticking to deadlines is hard work and it's a good habit to keep.

I've said all this because I've just been working past midnight to try to stick to a tight deadline for a book project I'm involved with, and it looks like I'll be a day late. I feel bad about this, but it's an unusual project, and fitting the brief involved has taken much longer than I suspected.

Two wines sampled tonight. Both inexpensive, both from Waitrose, and both from Portugal. Sogrape's Duque de Viseu Dao 2002 comes from a dodgy vintage. It's dry, a bit earthy, a bit spicy and showing some evolution. There's a pleasing savouriness, together with a bit of sweet warmth. A good food wine without any rough edges, but it's fading fairly fast. Pleasant enough drinking now, though.

Altano 2004 Douro is a fairly supple, midweight style, that speaks (or rather mutters) its Douro origins without really exciting at all. There's a savoury, herbal edge to the red and black fruits, and it sort of clamps down quickly on the finish. This is a wine that would perform well with food, but on its own it comes across a little ungenerously. Mind you, at this price (£4.99) I'd take it in preference to just about any similarly priced branded wine. The 2005 Altano, recently tasted, is a real step up in quality.

These aren't great wines, but 10 years ago their equivalents would have been much worse. Portuguese wines are evolving fast - it's a country wine nuts should keep their eyes on.

Douro's best value?

As regular readers know, I'm a great fan of the new wave of table wines from the Douro. Thrilled by them, actually. They ain't cheap, though (not that they should be - it costs lots of money to make wines in such challenging terroirs), so it's nice to be able to find one that is really good as well as being quite affordable. For me, this is probably the best value Douro wine at the moment - other possible contenders are the Vale de Clara from La Rosa and the Prazo de Roriz, but this is a bit of a step up from these.

Churchill Estates Douro 2004 Portugal
I like this wine a good deal: it tastes very much of the Douro and it's affordable, balanced and very drinkable. Nicely perfumed nose of dark spicy black cherry fruit with a savoury, dusty edge. The palate shows pure dark fruits with some spicy definition and a really attractive savouriness. Despite the relatively high alcohol (14.5%) this isn't a sweet, overripe style, but instead shows great balance and quite a bit of class. Very impressive. Very good/excellent 91/100 (£7.99 Majestic, currently on offer at £6.39 if you buy two)

Champagne and Portugal

Today was a busy day of tasting. Two unmissable events, for me at least: the annual tastings for Champagne and Portugal. The day began with a prompt 10 am start at Banqueting house for the Champagne gig, which was preceded by a pleasant wander over the Thames from Waterloo station. It was a lovely early spring morning, but a hint of freshness in the air and diffused, milky sunshine.

I tasted a lot of very good Champagnes, more than a few excellent ones and just a handful that I’d rate as just ordinary. Highlights rather predictably included the 1995 Krug, a monumental wine that won’t be approaching drinkability for another five years at least, and also a couple from Jacquesson: the 1996 vintage and the non-dosage Dizy 2000. Tarlant impressed, as did Larmandier-Bernier.

Then it was off to Lords, a beautiful venue for a tasting on a bright Spring day. Main focus here was the selection of 2005 cask samples from the Douro (very promising vintage; possibly a little better than 2004). The big surprise was the presence of Alvaro Castro (of Quintas da Pellada and de Saes in the Dão) – he doesn’t usually come to the annual tasting. He had a wonderful roster of wines with him, including the marvellous Caroussel, Dado and Pape wines, as well as wines from his two Quintas. I was really impressed by these. Sad aside: Alvaro remembered that I'd put a picture of his dog on my website, roaming his vineyard. The dog is no longer, having been poisoned by hunters, he reveals.

Now I’m on the way home, with a stained, wine-residue mouth and reams of notes to type up. Tomorrow should be a little less strenuous: just the Majestic press tasting in the morning and then a tutored tasting of Vin Clairs in the afternoon.

Douro newcomer makes an impact

A week or two ago I was chatting to Christian Seely about his new venture in the Douro - Quinta da Romaneira - which he's involved with as one of a number of partners. They took a fairly run down Douro property of a couple of hundred hectares, of which some 75 were planted to vineyard, and revitalized it. The renovation included a luxury hotel, which is due to open this June, as well as the production of some serious wine. He promised to send me a bottle of the first release, the 2004.

Christian was true to his word. Came home this evening to find a bottle waiting, along with a handwritten note. Looks like we need to add another wine to the already impressive roster of top-flight Douro producers.

Quinta da Romaneira 2004 Douro, Portugal
A deep red/purple colour, this Douro red has a classy nose of sweet raspberry and blackberry fruit complemeted by some spicy, tarry complexity and sophisticated oak notes. It's pure, intense and quite exotic. The palate is firmly structured and spicy, but still shows more of this ripe, complex fruit character. The firm tannins suggest that there's some development to come, but it's already a modern, seductive wine with a hint of Douro wildness to it. Great concentration and focus, and reassuringly this isn't just another over-ripe late-picked international red (despite the hefty 14.5% alcohol). Very good/excellent 93/100

Crasto 2003

Off to Bordeaux tomorrow for a day trip, tasting a nice array of 2005s. Problem is, I have to leave at 04:30 am. Ouch. Should be in bed now, but I need to take a bath this evening to avoid waking the family and RTL tomorrow morning on my way out.

Tonight I'm drinking Quinta do Crasto 2003 Douro (£6.99 Adnams). It's very drinkable, with ripe, sweet dark fruits providing the gratification, and subtly green, tarry tannic structure providing a nice counter. There's nothing terribly heavy or serious about this wine, and the bright plummy, slightly sappy fruit is really appealing. This is a wine for current drinking that has a hint of the new world to it, but also speaks (albeit rather softly) of its Douro origins. Great value, and recommended at this price. Very good+ 87/100

Crasto is pictured above, from my first visit to the Douro in 2002.

Noval's table wines...a teaser

Spent the morning with Christian Seely and a bunch of journalists tasting Quinta do Noval's new Douro wines, along with several other 2004s from the AXA portfolio. Full write up to come, hopefully later today, but first a rather nice picture of the tasting. Usual rules: 1 point for each taster you can name. The Noval table wines are rather good.

A nice tasting...and a new discovery

Today’s Richards Walford tasting at the Baltic was a bit of a treasure trove: lots of interesting stuff. This year we had Riedel glasses – a great improvement on the restaurant glasses we had last year, an improvement for which we were all suitably grateful. [See my post here. Karen from R-W reminded me of this today, and pointed out that the glasses cost 0.50 each to rent.] ]In fact, if there’s one consistent change in professional tastings that I’ve noted over the last three or four years is the increasing use of the Riedel Chianti glass as the standard tasting glass over less suitable tasting glasses (including the rather small but otherwise nicely shaped ISO).

I didn’t taste as diligently as I could have done. I spent an afternoon, when there was plenty there to occupy me for the whole day. And I talked lots. It was nice to bump into Jorge Borges who was showing the Passadouro wines, and David Harvey, who is moving increasingly into the area of natural wines – a real interest of mine. It was also nice to chat to Alister Viner from Harrods, who I met in the Douro in July, and George Austin of Tulbagh Mountain Vineyards.

I met Olivier Jullien for the first time and tasted through a vertical of Mas Jullien from the Languedoc. These are impressive wines. But perhaps the ‘find’ of the tasting were the wonderful Châteauneuf du Papes of Isabel Ferrando at Domaine St Préfert. I don’t think I’ve ever tasted such an exciting set of wines from the Southern Rhône: these showed wonderful elegance and purity, alongside remarkable complexity. She was previously a banker with Credit Agricole, and only purchased her 15 hectares of vineyard in 2003, which was her first vintage. She gained experience with a number of winemakers, her biggest influence being Henri Bonneau. ‘Prefer my wines to be elegant and feminine, like those of Bonneau’, she reveals. ‘He doesn’t interfere much, but he understands’.

Olivier Jullien (pictured) wins the prize for best jumper of the day. Congratulations Olivier!

Passionate about Port

Normal tasting has resumed. I can smell again. Perhaps not perfectly, but then who smells perfectly all the time? Our physiological apparatus likely changes daily in subtle ways without us realising it. Tonight's tipple is a Single Quinta Vintage Port. It's Cockburn's Quinta dos Canais 1998, which is a good wine from a dodgy year. the Quinta is in the Douro Superior (it's pictured above, from my July visit to the Douro) and although Cockburn's purchased it relatively recently (1989), it forms the heart of their vintage Ports.

I like Port a good deal. It's quite hard to learn to taste Port well (in this respect, it's a bit like Champagne - you need to practice lots, which is no hard task). The key is not to be fooled by the fruit or the sweetness, but to look a little deeper, to the structure (at least when you are evaluating serious wines) .

This one shows good concentration, lots of fruit, and a lovely spicy tannic structure. There's nice definition and freshness to the fruit, with a fair bit of spicy complexity. It's rich and quite tarry, showing some evolution. It descends towards a fudgey, spicy, almost raisiny richness on the finish. I reckon this is a reasonably serious wine, but one that needs to be drunk sooner rather than later. It's quite perfumed, and for this reason I'd recommend it as a wine that will give lots of pleasure, but only if it's drunk relatively soon (in the next three years - my wild prediction is that beyond this it will descend into soft, spicy anonymity). I'd score it 92/100 for current drinking.

In comparison with the Noval Unfiltered LBV 2000, which has been open a few days, this shows more ooomph and richness (by a whisker), but the Noval has a lifted, floral aromatic character and fruit freshness that this wine lacks.