My Vineyard Blog March 2015

Spring Bottling

With spring in the air we are looking to bottle new vintages of our wine before the onset of the summer heat. Pedra Basta 2010 is coming to an end and will be replaced by the 2011, a warmer, altogether riper year which has produced a soft, structured red. I am almost sorry to see the back of the 2010 which, although a weaker vintage, produced a lovely fruit-driven wine. Talking to a fellow producer at the Douro tasting in London this week, he agreed with me that 2010 was not the basket case that we thought at the time and that it produced some good fresh flavoured wines.

ProWein: Ground for Optimism or Pessimism?

Today is the last day of ProWein, the world’s largest wine fair. It takes place in the capital of trade fairs, Dusseldorff in Germany.  I was a ProWein virgin when I arrived on Saturday and the size and extent of the fair has taken me aback. Portugal is in Hall 10 (alongside Spain) and this alone would be large enough to contain a sizable national trade fair. There are eight more similarly sized halls housing the world of wine. I admit to not particularly liking large generic tastings and fairs as I much prefer a more focused event.