Written June 2010

It’s July and school’s out
 
If you have children you are probably counting the days for when the little gems will be heading back to school and I can guess you have been trying to steal a moment to sit quietly in your back garden and enjoy a glass of wine or three. For those of us that don’t have kids, well, we’ve been enjoying those quiet moments and the glass(es) of wine for awhile now. So whether you have kids or not, when you get that quiet moment here is a little something that might interest your taste buds.
 
Vinho Verde. A simple “green wine” from Portugal. This sprightly little wine’s vines are traditionally grown high above the ground to compensate for the lack of space that the grapes are grown in. Something like 90% of the holdings are less than 5 ha. The vines are trained to be grown on high granite posts leaving room for further vines to be grown underneath in order to maximize the space thus leaving the harvest to be done by hand from ladders perched against the posts.
 
Traditionally the wine is of lower alcohol content, approximately 10% by volume. This lower alcohol is a result of not using all the yeast during fermentation therefore creating an ever so slightly sweet wine. Suppressed carbon dioxide during fermentation creates a slight natural sparkling or “pétillance”, leaving the wine slightly acidic, very fresh, light and impressively fragrant.
 
Vinho Verde is perfect for that quiet moment in the sun, or if you just need to regain your sanity it is not so alcoholic that you forget you even have kids!
 
Sandy Ramsay