Esporão Alicante Bouschet 2015, Herdade do Esporão

One of my favourite Portuguese grape varieties – Alicante Bouchet is a lavishly fruited variety yet with top class examples like this one it maintains a polished, graceful personality, whilst combining intensity and purity.  Lots of rich black-fruits, cedary oak and smooth tannins.  Also lurking (in a good way!) are hints of liquorice, wild herbs, mint and spices.

Producer notes – 100% Alicante Bouchet from 3 vineyards, between 15 and 25 years old, planted on a variety of soils and altitudes all the way to 400m above sea level.

Herdade do Esporão: Andorinhos vineyard – Schist soils with sandy loam texture. Vines more than 15 years old.

Herdade dos Perdigões: Palmeiras vineyard – Granite soils, with clay texture, deep dark soils with good drainage. Vines more than 25 years old.

Propriedade dos Lavradores: Machuguinho Vineyard – Vineyard is located at an altitude of 400m, with granite soils and sandy texture. Vines more than 15 years old.

2015 presented the ideal conditions for this grape variety maturation. A dry winter followed by above average temperatures in spring and summer, gave rise to an early start to the harvest. Although temperatures continued to be high, there was no extreme heat during the vintage, and the dry conditions were excellent for fruit quality, producing wines with intense, persistent, aromatic fruit.

Hand-picked grapes are vinified in small concrete tanks and then aged for 1 year in French oak barrels and then 2 years in bottle.

It is only made in exceptional years and the result of intense experimentation and collaboration between Herdade do Esporão’s winemaking and viticulture teams. This involves the vinification of small blends of the same grape variety from different plots, in which the final goal is to understand and enhance the character of each grape associated with the type of soil and microclimate where it is grown.