The taste of Alentejo

In Portugal even in the most densely populated area (aka the suburbs) one can find a small neighborhood that is easily identifiable with a province region. Almada on the south bank of Tagus river just in front of Lisbon - the capital - is where I live for a couple of years.

Here there is a core of Alentejo and Algarve natives that moved in the 1950's and 1960's searching for a better life.

That wave of immigration for the Portuguese late blooming industry - at the time in boat construction and associated manufacturing - spawned the construction of new neighorhoods and businesses some of them that managed to thrive to our days.

Saturday early morning is a good time to get out of bed and go into the senior citizen filled streets, hit the markets and the delicatessens.

And... the Alentejo region is quite imprinted in these neighborhoods in the form of dedicated delicatessens.

In these shops you can find the best in the Alentejo region gastronomy and I'm lucky to have two of these shops at a 5 minute walking distance from my doorstep.

These two shops are a great source of wine and other goodies coming from this slow-paced region that is Alentejo. The next blogs reviews are going to address the multitude of wines that you can find there.

Stay tuned, folks!

Encosta da Serra White

After an extended halt on the reviews - that doesn't mean that wine has not been consumed in the middle - we're back to the world of tetra brick packaged wine.

Today's subject is the White counterpart of Encosta da Serra Red.

Visually it has a nice appeal. It seduces the eye with a nice and open gold-straw yellow in the glass.

On the nose something is quite wrong... what at beggining seems like a hard citrous scent turns out to something similar to a young vinegar. Picture a heavy iron 'perfume' - think of a railway yard where in a nearby track a train set has just performed an emergency break - telling me that some oxidation or another strange chemical reaction is taking place here.

I've even poured it in to another glass just to make sure that the washing had nothing to do with it. In the mouth terror ensues... and its proven. Greatly unbalanced, the iron taste is not negligible accompanied by citrus notes and an all over the palate watery sensation.

The wine is very short, 1/4 tongue tops and leaves an apple aftertaste. At all a true zurrapa. It gets 2 and not a 1 of ultimate zurrapa because of the good visual and the citric aromas and palate that somewhat manages to appear.

Stay tuned for the next tastings involving wine from local Alentejo region delicatessens that populate the Lisbon metropolitan area.

More Wine tastings are on the way, faithful readers!