Wines of Portugal: from the dry Douro to ports and madeiras

The two often come from the same grape varieties, on the same schist terraces. For Port, the fermentation is stopped with a wine spirit: sugar remains and the alcohol rises to around 20% abv. The dry red ferments right through, comes in at about 14% abv and is drunk at the table, with meat or a slow-cooked dish.

The ruby keeps the colour and the fruit of a young wine, aged away from the air: black cherry, blackcurrant, tannin still present. The tawny ages in small barrel in contact with oxygen, takes on an amber hue and notes of hazelnut, caramel and dried fig. The first calls for chocolate, the second for dried fruit and mature cheeses.

It depends on the family. A tawny or a colheita, already used to oxygen during its ageing, holds several weeks re-corked in the fridge. A vintage is drunk within two days, since it has just spent its life in bottle away from the air. Madeira beats everything, holding for months after opening.

Because it deliberately undergoes what wears other wines out. The wine is fortified, then heated at length, in a coil for the everyday cuvées or under the roof for the great lots, where the heat of the island works the barrel for years. Cooked and oxidised in advance, it becomes stable: a bottle from the last century is still alive.

Til rødvin giver Touriga Nacional struktur og en duft af violer, Touriga Franca finesse, Tinta Roriz fylde, Sousão syre, Baga fra Bairrada tanniner med lagringspotentiale og Jaen fra Dão blødhed. Til hvidvin skal du huske Alvarinho fra Minho, salt og præcis, og Encruzado fra Dão, den mest madvenlige af dem alle.

A young wine from the Minho, the damp, granite province of the north-west. The name refers to a region, not a colour: white, red and rosé are all made there. The usual style stays light, low in alcohol, with a touch of spritz. The alvarinho cuvées from Monção gain in density and age very well.

Several Portuguese estates ship by full case, and we keep that format to hold the price down. The price shown on each listing is the bottle price, with the sales format right beside it. A good part of the range is still available by the single bottle, notably from Quinta do Vallado, Quinta Das Maias and Quinta dos Roques.

Douro reds stand up to grilled red meat, lamb and slow-cooked dishes seasoned with bay. Those from the Dão, more slender, prefer roast poultry, pork and mushrooms. The Alentejo, fleshier, goes with stews and sheep’s cheeses. Serve them at around 16 °C.

Allow 8–10 °C for a white port or a dry sercial madeira, served as an aperitif. A tawny is better chilled, at around 14 °C, which tightens its sweetness. A vintage or an LBV is served at 16 or 17 °C, the former decanted, as it throws a heavy deposit.

Take a Douro red at around fifteen euros and a Dão white to grasp the two faces of the dry wines, then an aged tawny to understand the fortified style. Those three glasses set out the grammar of the country. The Port and Madeira pages then take over.