Boa e a vida, mas melhor e o vinho.
Life is good, but wine is better.
Quote from Fernando Pessoa (Portuguese poet)
The wines of Portugal are truly diverse. With over 250 indigenous grape varieties, you can always find a uniquely delicious experience.
We import Portuguese wines from small artisan producers who put 100% of their skill and passion into making wines that reflect the terroir of their vineyards. All use biodynamic, organic, minimal intervention practises. The care and consideration shown by our producers are reflected in our transportation method. All of our wines arrive by sailboat with minimal impact on the environment, making our wines as good as local. We unload in Bristol’s city harbour and are happy to be reintroducing historic trading links with our twin city of Porto. The ship has also sailed into central London at St Katherine’s Dock Tower Bridge to deliver to London customers.
Quinta de Romeu
The Meneres family have been on board with us from the beginning of our sail cargo journey. The Westerlies range of Douro wines is made especially for the sea crossing.
The family have owned their Quinta for five generations, and have several thousand hectares of olive groves, cork trees and vineyards in Tras-Os-Monte, Douro. The winemaker Mafalda Magalhaes makes wines from native grape varieties, and in the vineyards, she has used organic practices since 1997.
Our good friend Joao Meneres has visited Bristol a few times to introduce his family’s wines and support our events.
We also sell olive oil from the family estate which gained a score of 95/100 on the Flos Olei guide by Marco Oreggia – probably the most prestigious Extra Virgin Olive Oil guide in the world!
Mateus Nicolau de Almeida
We met Mateus at the very beginning of this voyage. He and Anton had an immediate connection – crazy plans were made and then realised. The PortoBristol project is the wine baby of these two unorthodox creative minds.
Mateus comes from a very prestigious wine lineage in Portugal. He’s a fifth-generation winemaker, his grandfather Fernando created Barca Velha and his father Joao produced Ramos Pintos first Douro wine. Mateus was crowned the Reengage winemaker 2016, Young winemaker of the Year 2014.
Mateus and his wife Teresa Ameztoy – who is an internationally renowned winemaker in her own right- work together using biodynamic and organic farming methods to produce wines that reflex the terroir of the Douro valley. The wines they make are a reflection of the soil, of the climate and different vinification techniques.
They work in the vineyards daily 100% hands-on and their winery is underground, blown out of and created in their “back garden”. The stone Lagares where the hand-picked fruit is foot trodden is directly above the fermentation vessel; this means the use of pumps etc. is minimal. Their partnership is truly mind-blowing. Their skill is evident when you taste the wines.
Mateus and Anton made the first PortoBristol barrel together which was well received after its journey to the Caribbean and back! The more recent barrels only travelled from Porto to Bristol.
Casa de Darei
Carlos Ruivo or our good friend “Mani” as we call him, works at his family home, an XV11 historic estate which has been in the family since1997. His wish was to restore the beautiful house and its vineyards on the shores of the river Dao to produce food, meat and wine for his family and his friends. He was becoming increasingly aware of the overproduction of foods and was committed to giving provenance to the food and wine provided for his family and friends. The vineyards use organic principles, excluding chemicals and using the winemaker’s skill and knowledge of the terroir to produce elegant examples of native Portuguese grapes finest Dao wines.
Mani has made barrels for the PortoBristol project and has visited Bristol several times. We even got him bottling one of his barrels at Underfall yard a couple of years ago!
Claustru’s
The oldest co-operative in the Douro Valley; Adega de Mesão Frio was set up in 1950 by the local farmers to ensure they got a fair price for their grapes. Using only native grapes, they pride themselves on producing outstanding quality wines using traditional methods. The co-operative may have grown and modernised since then, but it still proudly reflects the standards of those who started it.
Joao Tavares de Pina
How to introduce this winemaker? Joao is a force of nature. A man in tune with nature, never against it, he produces some of the most outstanding “natural” wines. His vineyards in Dao, granitic and clay shale soil, 500m are planted with chamomile and lavender promoting natural insect repellents. All grapes are hand-picked and fermented using ambient yeast. Joao, Luisa and their daughters are all champions of what is excellent about sympathetic winemaking, working with rather than against and producing some of the most deliciously quaffable wines ever!
Quinta Do Ferro
Micaela Fonseca is The “Sparkling Queen“. She left her family-owned Quinta in the “Douro Verde” to train as an architect, and despite having a very successful career, her heart was in the winery. Micaela is passionate beyond belief about her superb sparkling wines. The fruit enjoys a similar micro-climate to the Champagne region in France. All hand-harvested the wine is made in the traditional method. Quinta do Ferro Growers Espumantes ( Portuguese for Sparkling) are of exceptionally high quality, and once you try them you too will call her the Sparkling Queen.
Quinta de Gomariz
The Quinta is situated in the heart of Vinho Verde and is around 17 hectares of mainly loam soils, with an Atlantic ocean influence. These prime conditions, along with excellent sun exposure, enable celebrated winemaker Antonio Sousa to produce outstanding examples of single varietal Vinho Verde wines. These wines are the multi-award-winning with the Avesso being the Best of The Best Vinho Verde 2020
Quinta Val da Figueira
Joao Calem Hoelzer is the third generation to produce Port wine from his family 16-hectare Quinta near Pinhao in the Douro valley. He’s also a total rock star! His expertise in Port wine production is unquestionable. The Tawny has a sublime complexity. The vintage is extraordinary with a unique freshness and his white Port with tonic will have you questioning G&T as your aperitif of choice. Joao’s daughter Marta will be taking the helm when she has finished her studies so she can continue this magnificent Port wine lineage.
Quinta Da Serradina
Antonio Marques da Cruz is a gentle, fun, warm-hearted man, and I believe this comes across in his wines. He is the fifth generation on his family’s Quinta. The vineyards were planted in 1957, on clay-limestone soils on a south-facing slope with an Atlantic climate. His father chose to use organic practises in 1994 before they were considered in Portugal. This is why the bottles have a little ladybird on the corks- to indicate and celebrate their chemical-free farming and production methods.
Antonio won Portuguese Revolutionary Wine Producer award in 2017, but he’s not a man who chases accolades and only releases vintages from years he considers to be outstanding. His wines are wonderful, as is the man himself.
Vale da Capucha
Pedro Marques and his family hold a special place in our hearts. Not only because they are such generous hosts or that one sip of their cold white wine transports me right back to the summer when we visited the Quinta. They also had a litter of Jack Russel puppies that kept our girls in raptures whilst we talked wine!
The vineyard outside Lisbon is clay-limestone with a massive amount of fossils with an Atlantic climate. He uses organic practises and indigenous grapes, ambient yeast and minimal intervention to produce wines that are a pure expression of the terroir. Pedro’s wines are full of sea air minerality and life.
