Tag Archive | "Vinho Verde"
Post script: everybody’s doing it – Howards Folly Alvarinho 2010 Vinho Verde
Just a quick post today, indeed post script, following up on last Monday’s blog (here) about the popularity of Vinho Verde amongst winemakers from other regions of Portugal. I mentioned that it prompted me to stick a bottle of the maiden vintage of Howards Folly Alvarinho 2010 Vinho Verde in the fridge. It has since graced my wine glass on [...]
Continue reading...Everybody’s doing it: new Vinho Verde finds
Posted Monday 31st October 2011
Never let it be said that I don’t hunt high and low in pursuit of new vinous finds. In Copenhagen, I discovered a new Vinho Verde – a fine match, no doubt, for Denmark’s fish-focused open sandwiches (Smørrebrød), though perhaps not pickled herring! (Pictured lunch at Huset Med Det Grønne Træ, highly recommended). It may [...]
Continue reading...Vinho Verde Alvarinho v Rias Baixas Albarino – Portugal takes the lion’s share of medals at the Alvarinho International Wine Challenge
Posted Thursday 7th July 2011
Readers know what a huge fan I am of Alvarinho from the Vinho Verde Sub-region of Monção Melgaço and I’m not alone in my passion for it. The variety has won over many converts to Vinho Verde – Alvarinho at any rate – whenever I show it at tastings. So I’m thrilled to see how well these [...]
Continue reading...Dócil but by no means docile, the Niepoort Vinho Verde formerly known as Girasol
Posted Wednesday 6th July 2011
At Niepoort’s Big Day tasting in May an amuse-gueule of fresh oysters served with Niepoort Dócil Vinho Verde 2010 most definitely amused this girl. Made from 100% Loureiro, which thrives in the sub-region of Lima from which the grapes are sourced, Dócil is Niepoort’s new name for Girasol. With significantly less residual sugar than the earliest vintages [...]
Continue reading...Quinta de Soalheiro Alvarinho Vinho Verde: a vertical and, first taste, Soalheiro Dócil
Posted Monday 29th November 2010
Soalheiro means sunny so, in this icy weather, the thought of Quinta de Soalheiro’s sunny slopes is as warming as the memory of the wines themselves, among my favourite whites. Owners the Cerdeira family specialise in Alvarinho, which thrives in the warmer, drier north of the Vinho Verde, in the sub-regions of Monçao and Melgaço. [...]
Continue reading...Good Vinho Verde: not just Alvarinho…
Posted Monday 20th September 2010
As you know, I’m a huge fan of Alvarinho from Portugal’s Vinho Verde region. And the variety is on the move, in Portugal and elsewhere in the world thanks to the popularity of Albarino (same grape) from Spain’s Rias Baixas. However, I’m pretty certain that I won’t be coming across it in Australia over this next three [...]
Continue reading...Tasting Vinho Verde with the guru – Anselmo Mendes
Posted Friday 3rd September 2010
Third time lucky and so it was on my recent visit to Portugal in July where I caught up with Vinho Verde supremo Anselmo Mendes. He’s a busy man, making Vinho Verde under his eponymous label and consulting widely to, among others, Quinta do Ameal, Casa de Cello (both Vinho Verde) and Douro producer Alves [...]
Continue reading...Afros, Bryn Terfel & Divinho Verde
Posted Wednesday 25th August 2010
Put a wine-loving world renowned baritone and an architect turned passionate biodynamic wine producer in one room and there’s bound to be chemistry. And so it was when Bryn Terfel met Vasco Croft, the man behind Afros Vinho Verde. Tasting Afros Loureiro to Croft’s backstory on the Afros name (Afros was born to celebrate the birth [...]
Continue reading...Visiting Vinho Verde & an Alvarinho focus
Posted Tuesday 3rd August 2010
Fly to Oporto and you can easily cover Vinho Verde and the Douro in a week and what a great contrast each region makes, topographically, climatically and, it follows, vinously. That’s precisely what I did a couple of weeks ago and, though I was work-focused, it’s obvious that the Vinho Verde and the Douro are [...]
Continue reading...Afros Sparkling Vinhao Reserve – a red Vinho Verde, cracking with sardines!
Posted Friday 23rd July 2010
Visting a leading Vinho Verde producer last Sunday, I was almost embarrassed to admit that my experience of sardines thus far has been limited to the tinned variety. You see I’m not very keen on bones and, in the type of sardines I’ve eaten to date (OK, sardines on toast say 30 years ago), the bone [...]
Continue reading...Vinho Verde for breakfast, lunch and dinner!
Posted Sunday 18th July 2010
An early start yesterday to catch the 6.15am plane to Oporto! Kicked off a day of Vinho Verde tasting in the city tasting medal winners from the Best of Vinho Verde Awards before heading up to the pretty granite hewn town of Melgaco (pictured) for an Alvarinho focus at the Solar do Alvarinho. Dinner with Vinho [...]
Continue reading...Vinhão Vinho Verde & beetroot – summer chilling and living dangerously!
Posted Friday 9th July 2010
Beetroot for dinner last night and what better match, colour-wise at least, than Vinhão. This, Vinho Verde’s lead red variety, is a teinturer grape which means it has red skin and flesh, so its wines are the deepest shade of purple. Amazingly, my beige shorts (pictured below) survived the triple whammy of beetroot and a pair of red Vinho Verde from [...]
Continue reading...Alvarinho: Gomariz does strike Gold & Tapada dos Monges 2009
Posted Saturday 5th June 2010
I stand corrected, Quinta de Gomariz Alvarimho 2009 did strike gold, nothwithstanding my earlier blog here announcing the results of the Best of Vinho Verde Awards 2010. It didn’t catch my eye in the awards because the result appears under Vinho Regional Minho not Vinho Verde (the grapes are not from the sub-region of Moncao). [...]
Continue reading...Best of Vinho Verde 2010 Awards
Posted Thursday 3rd June 2010
You may have noticed that I’m a big Vinho Verde fan so I was sorry to turn down judging at this year’s annual awards hosted by the local Comissão de Viticulture da Região dos Vinhos Verdes on account of other commitments. Judging is always a great opportunity to discover some names you didn’t know and, [...]
Continue reading...Vinho Verde, variety and variety
Posted Sunday 2nd May 2010
Most Vinho Verde is a blend of several varieties, but if there’s a stand out grape, it’s got to be Alvarinho (known over the border in Galicia, Spain, as Albarino). The variety is spreading its wings outside Vinho Verde and fast assuming the mantle of Portugal’s flagship white grape variety. Take Poeira Pó de Poeira [...]
Continue reading...From white to pink elephant and other tales from the jungle – highlights from the Annual Portugal tasting
Posted Friday 16th April 2010
It pays to focus at annual generic trade tastings – so many wines, so little time – it’s a jungle out there! At Tuesday’s Annual Portugal tasting, I really had my work cut out for me because I was also presenting tastings on the hour every hour. My tactic? To make a beeline for wines [...]
Continue reading...Portuguese wines – some (The) Capital food and wine matching!
Posted Tuesday 24th November 2009
Presented a superb tasting at The Capital in Knightsbridge yesterday for Waitrose Food Illustrated readers. Lots of positive comments about the wines, surprise about how good even modestly priced Portguese whites now are (take a bow Quinta de Azevedo Vinho Verde 2008 & Jose Maria da Fonseca Periquita White 2007) and some capital, of course, [...]
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Posted Monday 7th November 2011
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