Vera means true in Portuguese, and the wine was built as a corrective. Estate fruit only, less residual sugar and less fizz than the category norm, made by people who thought Vinho Verde could be a serious wine rather than a soft drink.
Tasting Notes
Pale in the glass with the faintest bead. Lime and pink grapefruit lead, with yellow grapefruit, lemon and pear behind and a white peach note in riper years. Each variety does a job: Arinto carries the bright acidity and the capacity to age, Azal is citric and fresh, Loureiro brings the aromatics and the delicacy. The result has genuine texture and medium body, which is unusual here, and the granite gives an almost ferrous edge underneath. The carbonation is very light and the sugar low, so it finishes clean and dry rather than sweet and spritzy.
Quick Facts
- Grapes: 60% Arinto, 30% Azal, 10% Loureiro
- Origin: Portugal, Vinho Verde DOC, Basto sub region
- Vineyards: 100% estate fruit from 104 plots, vines planted in 1998 at 320 metres
- Soil: Sandy loam over granite with some schist, in a region taking around 2,000 mm of rain a year
- Style: Dry white, unoaked, very light carbonation, low residual sugar
- Winemaking: Entirely manual harvest into 20 kg crates picked variety by variety, Loureiro first and Azal sometimes into November, destemmed and gently pressed, juice settled 48 hours, fermented in stainless steel, bottled in February
- Alcohol: Around 12.5%
- Suitable for vegans
Food Pairing
Fried fish, shellfish and bivalves, sushi and sashimi, lighter cured meats, sharp cheeses, salads and simple pasta. Also a good base for a spritz.
Serving
Serve at 10 to 12°C, achieved by opening the bottle once it comes out of the fridge.
About the Producer
Vinho Verde built its reputation on light, sweetish, fizzy wine, a style that took hold in the 1950s and 60s when Portugal was resisting the arrival of soft drinks and these bottles became the everyday alternative. Vera was created to push the other way. From the first release the brief was estate fruit only, lower residual sugar and far less carbonation than the region traditionally used, all of it running against the commercial norm. Drawing on 104 separate plots on one estate in Basto gives the blend consistency from year to year, and the extra structure is what separates it from the supermarket version of the category.
