Portugal: White, including Vinho Verde
2018 Gold 3 Silver 7 Bronze 3 Commended 14
2017 Gold 2 Silver 8 Bronze 9 Commended 6
In terms of medal count, there were no major surprises here. Three Golds is pretty much bang on what we’d expect. The big change on last year was the drop in overall medals and the rise in Commendeds, suggesting that the 2016 vintage wasn’t quite as good as 2015, which is mostly what we got last year.
The other key trend was the continued rise of Vinho Verde. Five years ago, it was all but invisible. Now it garners a good number of medals every year and, perhaps more importantly, attracts a lot of positive feedback from our tasters.
FROM THE TASTING TEAMS
‘The cheapest wine was the best value wine I’ve tasted so far today.’ Debbie Warner, Wild Wine Club
‘Even at the very expensive end we could see the potential – world-class wines.’ Charlie Young, Vinoteca
‘They’d work at Wiltons. Good value wines, and I really liked the top end around £20 – quite expensive for Portuguese white wines but very good.’ Yohann Pinol, Wiltons
‘We sell some Vinho Verde, but that’s it for Portuguese whites. I would definitely consider some from today – a very good tasting.’ Lazaros Engonopoulos, Coq d’Argent
‘The Vinho Verdes were really classy and bracing – an alternative to Muscadet or Txakoli. They spoke of place.’ Simon Woods, team leader