Wine & Soul Pintas Douro Tinto 2022

Drink now or cellar for up to 17 years. Decant 1 hour before serving. Wine & Soul was founded in 2001 by husband and wife Sandra Tavares da Silva and Jorge Serodio Borges in Portugals Pinho Valley. The couple were already esteemed winemakers; Sandra makes wine at Vale Dona Maria and at her familys Quinta de Chocapalha estate, while Jorge used to work as a winemaker at Niepoort. The couple purchased an old historic port lodge and began buying top quality fruit from Pinho Valley until 2003 when they acquired their own vineyard planted with 76-year old vines. Their prized 2-hectare vineyard is planted with 30 different local varieties which requires an exceptional level of skill to manage due to their different maturation periods and requirements. Over the years they have also added other vineyards including the magnificent Quinta da Manoella. Pintas is their flagship wine, a single vineyard bottling crafted from the exceptional Pintas vineyard which is planted with 80 year old vines of 35 different varieties. The wine is made as a field blend with the grapes carefully selected and trodden by foot in old stone lagares or troughs. The young wine ages for 22 months in French oak barrels. This creates a rich and incredibly complex red wine with intense notes of cassis, black cherry and blackberry seasoned with spice and dried herbs. Full bodied and well-rounded on the palate, this is a great wine to keep in the cellar for a few more years or savour with hearty red meat dishes.