After 3 years of aging in French oak barrels and in the bottle, our Grande Porcaria Premium 2023 was finally released. We might not take ourselves too seriously but we do make pretty good wine.
We were kept busy all the time. The red Talha Moreto was very popular with people coming back to try again, so we ran out of it. The white Talha Antão Vaz was also very popular and we ended with only 1 bottle left at the end of the fair. Made some great contacts - the first step in establishing distributors in various countries.
Our first of Moreto a fresh light red aged in clay amphorae, and we pulled up 1 ha with a mix of "what me not" tired red that we replaced with this hardy regional variety, with another 2 ha on the way. This year we also hit it right on the head with our white Antão Vaz single variety and Aragonez with a fantastic salty note, as well as our first fruity Alicante Bouschet and Touriga Nacional.
2023 was our first discrete attendance at ProWein, with the kick-off for our sales activities. An excellent event with great feedback and response to our first wines.
2023 was our first discrete attendance at ProWein, with the kick-off for our sales activities. An excellent event with great feedback and response to our first wines.
We also started the renewal of our vines with pulling up 3 ha with a mix of tired red varieties (Alicante Bouschet, Aragonês, Castelão and Trincadeira), that we replaced with our favorite white Antão Vaz.
While working hard to recover the vineyard and convert it to sustainable farming we had our first harvest in late Summer 2021. Made our first totally artisanal wine experiments and micro vinifications as well as our first wines for sale. Plenty of manual labor but a lot of fun trying the finished wines and deciding which to age.
Unfortunately we were only able to finalize the acquisition of our first 12 hectares in late Spring 2021, but we got cracking right away and put a stop to all use of pesticides and herbicides, restricted soil fertilization to organic matter, and made our first not very successful attempt at establishing a cover crop in the vineyard. We did however achieve the Integrated Production Mode certification and joined what is probably the most exacting sustainability program in the world https://sustentabilidade.vinhosdoalentejo.pt/en whose certification we are working very hard to achieve by Summer 2023.
The First Sustainability Certificate
It all started in 2019 when we finally decided that we needed to do something down-to-earth and sustainable, and started scouring Portugal for a property we could afford and was appropriate for our dream of producing high-quality wines and olive oils.
After 2 years of running around looking, we finally found a total of 12 hectares just on the outskirts of Reguengos de Monsaraz, a bit neglected but which we believed we could turn around and produce wines and olive oils that could go head-to-head with the best in world.