The warm spring rays are now browning your ghostly winter skin; the orange light streams in through your windows well into the early evening; the air is heavy with aromas of fresh cut grass and blooming white lilies, all signaling the perfect time to finally indulge yourself with a bottle of white wine. The big question, however, is which one?

Having come off of two months dedicated to La Rioja, and five long months of winter weather, we opened our refrigerator to a dozen bottles of white, rose and cavas, all beckoning our palates. Yet, behind the small jars of capers, deep in the way back of the refrigerator, past the Norwegian caviar, sat one bottle of Herdade Grande Colheita Seleccionada 2006. We had actually received this wine from the winemaker last summer during our unexpected whirlwind Portuguese wine tasting in Lisbon. So it was fun for us to pull this wine out from the depths of the refrigerator, enjoying some wonderful memories from our stay.

The winery itself is located approximately 5 miles from Vidigueira in the Alentejo. Owning 350 hectares of land, only 60 hectares are under vine, while the remaining 80 hectares are devoted to arboreal culture, 40 to olive groves and the rest to cow pastures. Soils are comprised of primarily red schist, varying in texture from porous to smooth and compact of which both red and white varietals are grown. Native red grapes grown are Arganoes, Trincadeira, Alfrocheiro, Tinta Grossa, Tinta Caiada, Touriga Nacional, Touriga Franca, Alicante Bouchet, among none native red varietals such as Syrah and Cabernet Sauvignon. As for white, they grow Antao vaz, Arinto, Roupeiro, Rabo de Ovelha, Perrum, Monteudo and Fernao Pires.

The Herdade Grande Colheita Seleccionada 2006 is made from two common …

Editor’s Note: During our month long dedication to Cava wine, we’ve made a little detour to the west, bringing you a unique style of sparkling wine elaborated in the heart of Portugal. However, when starting this article, I quickly realized that I dove into a subject that few have tackled. What is listed in wine encyclopedias, wine journals, websites and Portuguese books barely skim topic as to what defines a Portuguese sparkling wine. Try looking for information on exports, pricing or major producers, and you might as well throw in the towel. Hence, what I’ve compiled below is my best effort at trying to understand this topic with the help of from Viniportugal (Thank you Maria Joao!). I will be adding more details to this article, or posting additional articles, on the topic. In the meantime, if anyone can offer information, please don’t hesitate to chime in! I would love for us to put together something more comprehensive, and dare is say, accurate.

For those of you who can time travel back to August, when we attended a mask exhibit and wine tasting in Lisbon, you may remember an article where we essentially gushed adoringly over sparkling wines made by Murganheira, a Portuguese wine producer based in the Tras-o-Montes region. Today, with a bottle of Quinta da Lixa Espumante Bruto from DOC Vinho Verde, sitting in front of me, we thought it would prudent for us to give you a more expansive understanding of what it means to produce sparkling wine in Portugal.

Espumante, pronounced esh-pu-man-te, is the Portuguese version of a sparkling wine. And unlike Cava, produced solely in northern climates, Espumante is not only produced in the northern wet region of Vinho Verde, …