The Northern Interior
North of the Tejo river, and inland from the coast, Portugal sees a dramatic rise in elevation. These highlands, sitting upon mountains of mostly granite, but also metamorphic veins of schist, quartz, and marble contain Portugal’s most well known wine regions: the Douro River Valley, the Dao, and Vinho Verde. Lesser known vinous treasures are also found in these mountains, such as the Tras-os-Montes in the far north east, or Portalegre, a northern satellite of Alentejo.
While there are subtle coastal influences in the western most corners, and more arid pockets in the planes of the far east, much of the most highly regarded wine from the northern interior comes from the mountains, which both shelter the vines and create large diurnal temperature swings for easy ripeness with balanced acidity and a more prominent fruit expression. That being said, the extremely mountainous terrain means that even vineyards that are quite close together can create wines of drastically different qualities as elevation and aspect suddenly shift. This variability has created tremendous opportunities for adaptability as both global tastes and climate start to shift.
Douro
The Douro is arguably the oldest commercial wine region in the world, first delineated for its special fortified wine in the mid 18th century. Today, however, the region is going through a greater degree of change than ever before. A full half of the wine produced in the Douro is now unfortified table wine, a shift that is causing winegrowers to re-examine certain maligned grape varieties and reassess the quality of certain vineyard zones that were considered sub-par for Port production. Traditionally, the highest quality vineyard land was considered to be the heart of the heart of the Douro, around the village of Pinhao in central Cima Corgo, on the north side of the Douro river where vineyards faced the southern sun. Increasingly, however, winemakers seeking to produce ambitious table wine are moving further along various tributaries to higher elevations, northerly exposed slopes, and slightly richer (i.e. granitic) soils in order to achieve slower, more evenly paced ripening.
The varietal compositions of the wines are also starting to change. Traditionally, port wine production was dominated by Touriga Nacional, with Touriga Franca, Tinta Roriz (Tempranillo), Tinta Cao, and Tinta Barroca all playing supporting roles. These grapes also make up most of table wine production, but more obscure grape varieties are being reconsidered and replanted as well. Grapes such as Sousao, Bastardo (Trousseau), and Malvasia Preta are increasingly prized in the Douro for their ability to produce more delicate red wines even in a hot climate. Top quality white wines might just be the biggest, and most pleasant surprise, of the Douro’s table wine transition. Grapes such as Viosinho, Gouveio (Godello), Malvasia Fina, and Rabigato all work well at relatively low levels of ripeness, and a style of early picked, textural white wine is starting to emerge with a lot of success. It is not as extreme in this style as Hunter Valley Semillon, but that gives you an idea.
Vinho Verde
North west of the Douro you have Vinho Verde, which stretches from the rainy Atlantic coast to the much, much drier Tras os Montes just to the east. While the region is most known for the bright, slightly spritzy white wines of the same name, high quality production has traditionally only been recognized around the varietal Alvarinho (Albarino) wines of the villages of Moncao and Melgaco on the Minho River at the Spanish border. This region is roughly equidistant from the Atlantic Ocean to the west and desertous mountains to the east; a more sheltered, continental micro climate where one can more consistently fully ripen grapes. In contrast with Rias Baixas in Spain, where the highest quality Albarino was traditionally seen as coming from the western coast, and is quite salty and mineral focused, the Alvarinho from Moncao e Melgaco tends to be more fruited and floral in quality, yet still with bountiful acidity. In the right hands these wines are almost Riesling like.
Beyond Moncao and Melgaco, however, many of the cooler, wetter areas of Vinho Verde are being re-examined for quality wine production. A warming climate means that ripeness is no longer a grower’s chief concern, and the Atlantic weather as well as the more diverse plantings of grape varieties of western Vinho Verde have their own advantages. Vinhao, a red grape that used to make up the majority of Vinho Verde’s production in the 18th and 19th century, is being re-embraced with verve to make light, bright red wines (albeit with intense pigmentation, Vinhao will stain your teeth!). Older vineyards interplanted with grapes such as Loureiro, Arinto, Alvarinho, and Trajadura are also being taken away from bulk vinho verde production and brought back into the making of higher quality still wines. Overall the region is moving in a direction not unlike their Spanish neighbors to the north in Ribeira, with explosively aromatic yet fresh white wines and tartly bright, easy drinking reds.
Dao
South east of the Douro you have the Dao, where the granitic mountains of the Northern Interior open up in dramatic fashion, creating a valley that is sheltered from the cool Atlantic air of Bairrada just to the west and the hot, dry, Beira to the east. Whereas the Douro and Vinho Verde developed as wine regions under intense commercial pressures from abroad, the Dao developed as a wine region through polycultural subsistence, the quality of the wine becoming known alongside any number of other crops and consumed mostly inside Portugal. Like other wines in the Northern Interior, the qualities of the vineyards here are often discussed in terms of elevation and aspect. For most of the 20th century, winemaking moved its way down to earth in order to ease mechanical harvesting, and these vineyards became planted to just a few grapes, namely the Touriga Nacional, Jaen (Mencia), and Encruzado and were mostly vinified by quantity minded co-operatives.
Within the last 20 years however, there has been a push back up the mountains as quality minded winemakers seek poorer soils, more extreme diurnal shifts, and old vineyards planted to complex field blends of dozens of grape varieties. The foothills of the Serra da Estrela (mainland Portugal’s highest mountain range) in the eastern Dao have in particular become a popular destination for the most ambitious winemakers in the region. Here the wines take on a level of elegance and intensity that is some of the greatest in Portugal. The white wines in particular, which in recent history have become more and more focused on the Encruzado grape (although the turn back to old field blended vineyards is once again changing this), take on a Burgundian balance of richness and verve.
Portalegre
While most of Alentejo’s wine production is found in the vast open plains of south eastern Portugal, with huge estates planted to mostly international varieties and Touriga Nacional, there is one sub-region where the geology and climate is sufficiently like the Northern Interior of the country that it makes more sense to talk about it in this context: Portalegre. In contrast to the wide open sandstone planes that have allowed for a vast and mechanized winemaking industry in southern Alentejo, Portalegre sits at an average of 750 meters of elevation in the Serra de Sao Mamede, a granitic mountain range in the far north east of Alentejo on the border of Spain. The mountainous terrain meant that industrial wine production could never really flourish here, and instead of vast, ranch style estates, most vineyards would more accurately be described as gardens or food forests, small pockets of polycultural production, often planted with dozens of grape varieties along with various fruit, nut, and olive trees as well as other fruit and vegetables. The high elevation also helps the region capture much more cool air and moisture than the rest of Alentejo.
In the last decade, as freshness in wine has become more of a priority for everyone, Portalegre has seen a renewed sense of interest, both from estates in southern Alentejo looking to purchase grapes to add freshness to their blend, and young upstarts looking to make authentic Portalegre wine true to its climate and history. To give you some idea of the style, the wines of Portalegre are somewhat reminiscent of the central Loire. The white wines have high acidity, a waxy texture, and lots of wet, organic aromas somewhat like good Chenin Blanc. The red wines then, are juicy and fresh, yet not without a lingering sense of structure and herbal complexity, somewhat like Cabernet Franc.