According to general manager and oenologist Pedro Ribeiro, Herdade do Rocim has “probably the most expensive amphorae in the world.” Rocim sent clay from their ancient vats – a staple of aging wine in Alentejo for centuries – to a university in Montpelier for analysis, in order to create newer amphorae that had the same…
Category: kick-ass wines
Wine in the Time of Coronavirus, Part 6 (Attack of the Single Vineyard Clones with Gary Farrell)
As the Coronavirus has most of us sipping while we SIP, the wine media world has been (in lieu of our normal mode of being able to travel to experience wines directly and visit the people and places that make them) undergoing a plethora of “virtual” tastings. Personally, I’m now into double-digits on the ZOOM…
Wine in the Time of Coronavirus, Part 5 (“Courage of Convictions” with Smith-Madrone)
The latest in the steady stream of sipping during SIP virtual tastings brings up back to longtime friend of 1WD Stu Smith, one of the masterminds behind Napa Valley’s well-regarded Smith-Madrone. If you’ve spent any appreciable time perusing this little website, then you know that Smith is smart, verbose, and opinionated – all of which…
Alentejo Postcard, Part 2 (Herdade de Coelheiros Recent Releases)
Among the 800 hectares of property upon which Alentejo’s Herdade de Coelheiros grows walnuts and cork trees sits about 50 hectares of vines. Though their history date back to the mid-1400s (as a hunting estate), those vines that source Coelheiros’ modern wines were replanted over 500 years later, in 1981. That’s because under Portugal’s dictatorship,…