2017 Pintas

A field blend of more than 40 varieties from an 87-year-old vineyard in the Vale de Mendiz in the Pinhão Valley. Foot trodden and fermented over 10 days in stone lagares and the malolactic conversion and 20 months in French oak. Just 6,000 bottles produced. TA 5.8, pH 3.64.   Dark cherry red with purple rim and opaque core. Darker and less open than the Pintas Character 2017 but still deeply aromatic. Here the fruit is less come-hither and the rocky Douro character dominates. A mineral intensity of the region. There's a little more of a floral quality here compared with its sibling Pintas Character. On the palate, full and concentrated, deep, rich but also somehow savoury because of that Douro imprint. Fabulous fruit purity, the oak showing a little more in its restraint of the fruit and some dark chocolate flavours. Opens to rock dust scent and also a more floral quality. The freshness is as much in the rocky/mineral aroma and flavour than in the acidity, though there is no lack of that. Powerful and long but, like the Pintas Character, all in harmony. Should make old bones. Elegant and long even in infancy. (JH)