Winemaker Notes
With a dark crimson color, this Touriga Nacional boasts great concentration and aromas of bergamot and wild fruits, with violet and spicy hints. The taste is sweet, round and mature, with silky tannins. Red fruits follow through from the nose into a long, concentrated, fresh finish.
Serve at room temperature with light meat dishes, such as pork, or flavorful, hard cheeses from cow or sheep's milk.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
Powerful and concentrated, boasting medium-grained tannins that support the dense plum and berry flavors, which feature plenty of ferrous, minerally notes. Mocha and spice linger on the long finish. Very well-crafted, finely balanced and pure-tasting. Needs time in the cellar. Best from 2012 through 2020. 2,188 cases made.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2008 TOURIGA NACIONAL was fermented in stainless steel and then aged in a combination of new and old French oak for 16 months. Noting the touch of cream and vanilla on opening, which integrated with some time and should integrate more with some cellaring, this shows exceptionally well, well focused, aromatic and beautifully structured, with subtle concentration—it seems elegant in the mid-palate, but it is very persistent, mouth gripping and never seems thin. It drank rather well the next day, too, after refrigeration overnight. It becomes earthier and shows more character with air. Those who follow the Douro will all rightly say that the best wines are generally the blends, but this is an awfully nice Touriga Nacional with impressive structure, powerful, yet balanced, a candidate for the best monovarietal wine I’ve had from Vallado. While not as deep as Vallado’s Reserva (reviewed this issue), it is fragrant and graceful. It should be approachable young, but a couple years in the cellar would help a lot. There were 26,256 bottles produced. Drink 2012-2024.
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Wine Enthusiast
A perfumed, spicy and ripe wine, wood flavors balanced by great wafts of black fruit. It is elegant, with a significant wood element. It will develop over 3–4 years, bringing more of the fine berry fruits.
Gaining great popularity for its bold but beautifully aromatic dry red wines, Touriga Nacional is the noblest variety in Port wine. Most likely originating from the Dão region, today it grows throughout the Douro Valley as well. Somm Secret—As many as 80 grape varieties can be used to make Port wine, each contributing something unique to the resulting blend. Touriga Nacional adds great color, tannins and aromatics.
The home of Port—perhaps the most internationally acclaimed beverage—the Douro region of Portugal is one of the world’s oldest delimited wine regions, established in 1756. The vineyards of the Douro, set on the slopes surrounding the Douro River (known as the Duero in Spain), are incredibly steep, necessitating the use of terracing and thus, manual vineyard management as well as harvesting. The Douro's best sites, rare outcroppings of Cambrian schist, are reserved for vineyards that yield high quality Port.
While more than 100 indigenous varieties are approved for wine production in the Douro, there are five primary grapes that make up most Port and the region's excellent, though less known, red table wines. Touriga Nacional is the finest of these, prized for its deep color, tannins and floral aromatics. Tinta Roriz (Spain's Tempranillo) adds bright acidity and red fruit flavors. Touriga Franca shows great persistence of fruit and Tinta Barroca helps round out the blend with its supple texture. Tinta Cão, a fine but low-yielding variety, is now rarely planted but still highly valued for its ability to produce excellent, complex wines.
White wines, generally crisp, mineral-driven blends of Arinto, Viosinho, Gouveio, Malvasia Fina and an assortment of other rare but local varieties, are produced in small quantities but worth noting.
With hot summers and cool, wet winters, the Duoro has a maritime climate.