For The Love Of Port

How important do you feel producing mono-varietal table wines is for Portugal as a whole? As it is becoming more trendy to do so, should this be continued, if not increased ... or do you believe the strength of Portugal's table wines, lies in their old vine field blends?

Remember, this is not just about the Douro ...

Strictly speaking in red wine, I like the field blends of traditional wines from Dao, Douro, and Alentejano the way they are.

For high class special wines, Touriga Nacional mono-varietal's have been the some of the best Portuguese wines I have ever had and I think you (Roy) would agree.

I don't feel Portugal needs to chase this segment, their wines are excellent and don't need to re-invent the wheel. Save the single varietals for limited release and honor the varietals rather than flood the market and tarnish a great thing.

Moses Botbol wrote:I don't feel Portugal needs to chase this segment, their wines are excellent and don't need to re-invent the wheel. Save the single varietals for limited release and honor the varietals rather than flood the market and tarnish a great thing.

+1

I'm basing this more on Port than on wine, but I suspect it's true for both. Tasting the 5 single-variety components of the 1983 Ramos Pinto Vintage Port was a lot of fun and each component showed off its own particular flair, but under normal circumstances I'd rather have the finished blend. It would be fun to have limited release bottlings of various Port varieties, but I don't think anyone needs to put one into full-scale production.

Moses Botbol wrote:
I don't feel Portugal needs to chase this segment, their wines are excellent and don't need to re-invent the wheel. Save the single varietals for limited release and honor the varietals rather than flood the market and tarnish a great thing.

Exactly my thoughts. I've had a good number of single varietal wines and while most are a good effort, very few rise to the level of greatness. The Douro is known for making fantastic wines using a blend of grapes and this is where they should focus their main efforts on.

Roy Hersh wrote:How important do you feel producing mono-varietal table wines is for Portugal as a whole? As it is becoming more trendy to do so, should this be continued, if not increased ... or do you believe the strength of Portugal's table wines, lies in their old vine field blends?

Remember, this is not just about the Douro ...

Tough question. Alvarinho is an interesting story: by marketing the wines as a mono-varietal and from marketing perspective NOT as Vinho Verde (some are not even DOC Vinho Verde, others have "Alvarinho" in large letters and "DOC Vinho Verde" in small letters) they were able to distance them from the traditional image of Vinho Verde: very cheap, fizzy, very simple, and easy to drink. Alvarinho is now a separate category from a consumer point of view.

In the last few years there has been an increasing number of Loureiro (Vinho Verde) and Encruzado (Dão) wines showing up. This has helped raise the image and visibility of whites in general.

And of course Bucelas is a mono-varietal DOC (Arinto).

Just from these examples, I would say that mono-varietal wines have been and continue to be important for white wines.

In what regards red wines, the tradition in Portugal is clearly blends (Dão, Bairrada, Alentejo, Douro). With the introduction of modern winemaking techniques in the 1980s and 1990s a lot of experimentation was carried out and there was a time when mono-varietals were in fashion and every big producer had many mono-varietals. This fashion has ended and now I would say that mono-varietals are almost always novelties (Petit Verdots have popped up in Alentejo in the last 2 years!) or experiments (small bottlings). You find this in almost all regions.

The big exception is of course TN, which is now planted in most regions and the official entities involved in wine promotion are really pushing it as a brand for Portuguese wines. I do not really think this is such a good idea, our identity is in the blends and in the enormous amount of local varieties.