Recommendations please

Philip Harvey · Post by **Philip Harvey** » Tue Jan 23, 2007 2:57 am

One of my New Year's resolutions is to explore the red (table) wines of Portugal, and especially the Douro.

Can anyone give me some recommendations for some mid price range reds to make a start on. If they are easily available in the UK, so much the better.

Thanks.

Otto Nieminen · Post by **Otto Nieminen** » Tue Jan 23, 2007 4:55 am

Philip Harvey wrote:One of my New Year's resolutions is to explore the red (table) wines of Portugal, and especially the Douro.

Can anyone give me some recommendations for some mid price range reds to make a start on. If they are easily available in the UK, so much the better.

Thanks.

I think Côtto's Grande Escolha can be found fairly easily in the UK. The 2001 was one pretty fine wine and costs about 25€ here (which I think of as mid-priced).

It has been repeated ad nauseam, but if you don't mind a bit more modern style, Niepoort's wines rock. Redoma and Vertente are both IIRC mid-priced and should be available easily.

Post by **Andy Velebil** » Tue Jan 23, 2007 8:07 am

The dry wines from Quinta do Crasto are very good

Mario Ferreira · Post by **Mario Ferreira** » Thu Feb 01, 2007 11:10 am

Andy V. wrote:The dry wines from Quinta do Crasto are very good

I would like to reinforce Andy's comments :)

The dry wines from Quinta do Crasto are very good

Post by **Andy Velebil** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 12:57 pm

Mario,

Glad to hear from you...hope all is well and that your trip was fun. Did you find or try any good fortified wines while you were there?

Mario Ferreira · Post by **Mario Ferreira** » Mon Feb 05, 2007 4:06 am

Andy V. wrote:Mario,
Glad to hear from you...hope all is well and that your trip was fun. Did you find or try any good fortified wines while you were there?

Not really. Fortified Wines are not usual over there (in Mozambique) but one notice generally there's a bottle of inexpensive Port on the shelf on any given Bar :)

Post by **Roy Hersh** » Mon Feb 12, 2007 9:15 am

To be a bit more specific, the 2004 Quinta do Crasto Tinto, Douro Red and the RESERVE are both affordable, available and delicious. You should not have much difficulty finding them in your wineshop or otherwise on winesearcher.com

Enjoy!

Derek T. · Post by **Derek T.** » Tue Feb 13, 2007 6:10 pm

Philip,

Sainsbury offer 2 Douro reds. The more expensive of these (at around £7) is from Quinta do Crasto and is sold under the "Taste the Difference" brand. This same brand is used on a 1996 Vintage Port which is also from Quinta do Crasto. I know that the VP is actually the Crasto 96, not a separate bottling made for Sainsbury, so I think it is fair to assume that the dry red is also the real thing.

I have had 6 or 8 bottles of this recently and it is excellent. The lower priced (£5) wine is also good, but the extra £2 is well spent to have the TtD bottle.

Derek

Jay Powers · Post by **Jay Powers** » Wed Feb 14, 2007 10:59 pm

First, I'll agree that of all the dry reds I tried in Portugal, Quinta do Crasto was the top end. The Reserve is very nice and actually pretty good value at US $34. Their higher end wines are very nice (Touriga Nacional, Tinto, Maria Theresa) but impossible to find (Roy, where is the Tinto you mentioned available? Certainly not Broadbent Selections).

The Crasto low end ~US $10. is not quite as special to my taste, and another choice in the ~$10 price range is Quinta do Bomfim. I had this at a tasting at K & L wines here recently and bought a case. For the money this is a nice wine, although still young.

Another very nice wine is the Quinta do Vale Donna Maria Douro Red ~US $30.

Jay

tastingnote · Post by **tastingnote** » Tue Mar 06, 2007 9:55 am

I'm a manager of a shop that won Best Independent Portuguese Wine Merchant for 2006, so I'll suggest a few different wines to those already mentioned...

Casa de Saima Tinto from the Bairrada is great stuff and ages so well. The current vintage is 2004, and I'm on my last few bottles of 2001 which is very tasty. Quinta do Correio Tinto from Quinta dos Roques (Dao) is stunning and cheap at between £5 & £6.

Wines from the Douro include anything from CARM, this is an organic producer and his Quinta do Coa is lovely. Niepoort's Vertente (£10 - £15) is good, if a little over oaked for me.

I would also suggest trying Valle Pradinhos Branco - a Gewurtz/Riesling/Malvasia blend - that goes with pretty much any food, and Niepoort's Redoma Rose is perfect for summers.

If you want to learn more about Portuguese Wines, please feel free to email me, and I'll send you some literature and further suggestions. Even if you don't buy them from me!!!!

Peter

Todd Pettinger · Post by **Todd Pettinger** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 9:23 pm

I provide a third vote for the Q. do Crasto. It was one of two reds produced by various viIneyards under the control of Cristiano van Zeller that were presented at a tasting I recently attended. It (and the other red presented there) are two of THREE that I can say that I genuinely like and would (and have) buy/bought again. The Crasto was simply amazing. Not as dry as some reds (which the reason I like it... I do not like the overly-dry wines.)

Just my 2 cents! (Finally. A red wine topic I can actually talk about with some knowledge!! :))

Todd

Post by **Roy Hersh** » Wed Apr 25, 2007 1:52 am

Todd,

Cristiano van Zeller is the proprietor of Quinta do Vale Dona Maria and the Roquette family is the owner of Quinta do Crasto. Cristiano does act as a consulting oenologist for a bunch of Quintas, but Crasto is not one of them. If he was pouring Crasto in Edmonton, it was because his buddy Miguel Roquette was unavailable. But I saw them both a few days earlier in Vancouver and believe Miguel mentioned that he was heading to Alberta. As you know Ed from deVine was at the Vancouver Festival and actually sat with me at a Symington Port tasting.

Todd Pettinger · Post by **Todd Pettinger** » Fri Apr 27, 2007 11:33 pm

Roy,
I will definitely check with the folks from deVines as to what exactly was being poured, but I am almost certain one was the Crasto. (Your note on pouring for Miguel may be closer to the mark... I didn't take any notes on the red tables being poured) but have purchased the Crasto since that tasting and enjoyed it very much. If it was NOT one at the tasting, it was something with a similar, short name beginning with "C"...

Come to think of it, I don't believe Cristiano ever claimed that the first wine we sampled (that which I believe was Crasto) was "his"....

Unfortunately, after a long day at work, missing lunch and being paged out near the end of the tasting... my memories on everything but the ports (which I scribbled notes on) may be a bit muddled...

Todd

Mario Ferreira · Post by **Mario Ferreira** » Mon May 07, 2007 1:37 am

tpettinger wrote: [...] I will definitely check with the folks from deVines as to what exactly was being poured, but I am almost certain one was the Crasto. [...] Come to think of it, I don't believe Cristiano ever claimed that the first wine we sampled (that which I believe was Crasto) was "his"....
Unfortunately, after a long day at work, missing lunch and being paged out near the end of the tasting... my memories on everything but the ports (which I scribbled notes on) may be a bit muddled...
Todd

Todd, it might have been Crasto. I mean the way I understand the Douro Boys "brotherhood" :) is that any one of them could be showing every other's wines. So, having Cristiano van Zeller showing Crasto wines in Canada would have been a natural thing :)

The Douro Boys are:
* Quinta do Vallado
* Quinta do Crasto
* Quinta do Vale Meão.
* Quinta de Vale de D.Maria.
* Niepoort.

MF

For The Love Of Port

Recommendations please

Recommendations please

Re: Recommendations please

dry wines from Quinta do Crasto are very good