(sublinhados meus)
The joy of Portuguese wines
There was a wonderful old boy called John – Sir John – Wordie, who was a quintessential member of the establishment. A barrister, he spent much of his time defusing controversies before they had boiled over. In that enterprise, he never sought publicity, finding it much easier to dispense wise advice if no one knew who he was. An accomplished sailor from his RNVR days during the war, he was always a stalwart of nautical good and goodery – and he knew a very great deal about wine, especially port. A Texan can extract five syllables from Goddam: Go-o-o-day-um. John could do as well with port. Po-o-o-o-rt. It was a deeply reassuring sound. Whatever was going wrong with the world, as long as John was in his place, saluting the port, nothing could be as bad as it seemed.
His death was appropriate. At one of his favourite club tables, he suddenly fell forward, and that was that. If only this had happened 20 years later.
Port came to mind recently and with it, Portugal: England’s oldest ally since the Treaty of Windsor in 1386. The Portuguese have much in common with the English, both being maritime nations, both ready to yield to the temptations of imperialism. In that respect, the English were more fortunate. Portugal was regularly menaced by Spain, a stronger neighbour with a common boundary. We had our moat: the Channel. Although the Portuguese did well out of Brazil, they usually bit off more empire than they could chew.
But in the 18th century, links between Britain and Portugal were reaffirmed. As a result of the War of the Spanish Succession, an embargo was placed on French wine, which especially affected claret. That must have been exceedingly distressing to the oenophiles of the day, for the French were getting better and better at making wine: cf Pepys’s ‘Ho Bryan’. No doubt there was a certain amount of smuggling: ‘brandy for the parson, baccy for the clerk’ – and Bordeaux for the local nobleman’s cellar. But a lot of drinkers had to make do with port. In those days, this was a rough liquid which was not even fortified. Much later, Gladstone was asked how the Younger Pitt had managed to hold the House after drinking three bottles of port. ‘You must remember that most of his audience had not consumed less than two themselves.’
Earlier on, time passed. The restrictions were lifted and the Portuguese also learned how to make serious port: those glorious vintages which John Wordie could evoke so well. But outside England and Portugal, it is insufficiently appreciated. The locals wondered what to do, and came up with a solution. Like all good ideas, it seemed obvious – as soon as someone had it. Past the port vineyards runs the Douro. Upstream, that is the River Duero and its vineyards produce some of Spain’s finest wines. So why not draw on the Douro and sell Portuguese wines which should be cheaper to produce and easier to market?
A delightful girl called Sophia Bergquist inherited Quinta de la Rosa. One of the vineyards is the charmingly named Vale do Inferno. Sophia, who must be the most distinguished vigneronne ever to emerge from Girton College, set about broadening its repertoire. There is a heavy schist influence in the soil and the climate is ideal. The other day at Boisdale, we tasted her Tintos from 2014, 2020 and 2021. Balanced, sophisticated wines, they should commend themselves to anyone interested in serious stuff from new horizons.
Sophia also produces a white, Cerejinha 2021, drawing heavily on Albariño. Fresh, minerally and only 11 degrees, it would be an ideal aperitif and works well with smoked fish. We will hear more of Quinta de la Rosa, and the awards which will follow will be well-earned.
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