Casa Ferreirinha Vinha Grande Douro 2023

Ruby in colour, this wine opens with an intense nose of raspberry, strawberry, pepper and subtle hints of violet and tobacco. The palate delivers a refreshing acidity with further notes of fresh red fruit that are continued throughout the long finish.

Vinification took place at the state of the art winery at Quinta do Seixo in the Cima Corgo and Quinta da Leda in the Douro Superior. The grapes underwent destemming and soft crushing before being transferred to stainless steel tanks for alcoholic fermentation. During the fermentation, gentle maceration took place at controlled temperatures in order to obtain the ideal amount of extraction. Ageing took place in used French oak barrels for 12 months. The final blend was assembled following a rigorous selection process. The wine subject only to filtration prior to bottling.

The grapes for this wine were sourced from vineyards in the Cima Corgo (including Quinta do Seixo) and vineyards in the Douro Superior (including Quinta da Leda). The grapes from the hotter Douro Superior bring structure and body to the blend, while the grapes from the Cima Corgo contribute elegance and acidity. Soils in the Douro are composed predominantly of schist, a slate-like rock which fractures vertically, allowing the vine roots to dig deep to access water and nutrients to sustain them through the hot Douro summers.

Luís Sottomayor describes the 2023 vintage in the Douro as an “outstanding year” with wines showing “high concentration, good fruit and a lot of intensity”. The vintage was a stark contrast from the very hot and dry 2022 vintage, with a rainy winter and mild spring providing optimal conditions for budbreak. Despite lower disease pressure, intervention was required to prevent downy mildew and longer-lasting pests (green leafhoppers) in the vineyards. Increasingly frequent extreme weather events and localised hailstorms affected some of the Sogrape properties. Warm conditions without extremes throughout July and part of August, with some intermittent rainfall, resulted in an excellent ripening of the grapes. The harvest lasted almost two months, from 17th August to 11th October, with all grapes harvested by hand.