The Details
Visitors to Northern Portugal are often drawn to the beautiful Douro Valley; famous across the world for its wonderful port wines. The neighbouring ‘Entre-Douro-e-Minho’ region is less well-known outside of Portugal – sitting ’between the Douro and Minho’ rivers, it’s a region celebrated by the Portuguese themselves for a light, floral white wine known as vinho verde.
The ‘verde’ translates as ‘green’ but this doesn’t refer to the colour of the wine. Some say it’s the green of the landscape – quite a contrast to the barren-beauty of the Douro’s stoney vineyards. Others claim it’s the sense of the wine being naïve as it’s very young, hardly aged at all – the grapes are often harvested before they fully ripen, imparting a tangy, citrus flavour.
Portugal’s Denominacao de Origem Controlada (DOC) protects the country’s regional wines, and allows over fifty grape varieties to be used in the production of vinho verde. Alvarinho and Loureiro tend to be the most-popular varieties, and you’ll sample both at Quinta do Aveleda, where generations of the Guedes family have helped shape the traditions of vinho verde for over one-hundred and fifty years.
At Villa Seara, you’ll meet Sofia and Martin: small-scale winemakers with a deep devotion to quality over quantity. These passionate individuals represent the future of wine making in Portugal, and you’ll find their effervescence for wine making is infectious.
