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, …

The region of Bairrada occupies no more than 10,000 hectares, fractioned off by cooperatives and small producers like Quinta do Encontro. Although the region has been producing wine since the 10th Century, it wasn’t until the 19th century until it became a quality wine producing region as a result of one man’s efforts. António Augusto de Aguiar who not only dedicated his passion to wine production, but was also the first person to define the region’s borders in 1867. Consequently, in 1887, The Escola Prática de Viticultura da Bairrada, (The Wine School of Bairrada) was founded to both improve and promote the region’s wines. What the school has gained notoriety for, however, is developing the first sparkling wine of the region in 1890.

Yet, sparkling wine isn’t the region’s emblematic wine. Wines made from the Baga grape planted in clay soils is what has crafted the reputation of the Bairrada region. And if you remember from our previous article on Baga, it’s a varietal known for its bold rich color and powerful tannic structure, giving it great longevity but a mind bending intensiveness. Recently, Bairrada has expanded its portfolio to include more international varietals such as Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah, Merlot and Pinot Noir, alongside native varietals such as Touriga Nacional or Tinta Roriz.

This little intro into the region is important to understand our previous experience with Baga. Prior the opening the Preto Blanco, we had our reservations with this varietal. Although, this 10 hectare winery has been working hard under the careful direction of João Paulo Seabra Almeida
to blend Baga with other varietals such as Merlot and Touriga Nacional, we weren’t entirely sure what to expect. Fortunately, the news is …