Bucking the rosé trend – in style
Julian Reynolds, a fifth generation descendant of a British family that settled in the Alentejo in 1850, has been making his own wine for some 17 years in the northern Alentejo near Estremoz.
In the beginning it was all about high quality red wines and whilst whites were eventually added to the portfolio, it was not until 2015 that he finally agreed, under pressure from his distributors, to produce a rosé.
It is probably this reluctance to enter the highly competitive rosé market that led him to produce something quite different to the pale pink (and often disappointing) Provence imitations that have flooded the market over recent years here in Portugal.
What Julian has produced here is a serious rosé, a food wine that has enough body and structure to pair well with BBQ meats on a hot summer day in place of a light red. The wine is made from a blend of Touriga Nacional and Aragonez, and the vines are subject to extensive pruning giving a yield of just 4,000 litres per hectare, a great deal less than the 10,000 litres which is normal for grapes used in mass produced rosé.
On the nose it is fruity and vibrant with ripe red berry notes, there is volume in the mouth and good acidity with a dry finish and surprising length for a rosé at this price level – around €9 in supermarkets.
