On The Road To Becoming A Master Of Wine: First Speed Bump, Certified Specialist Of Wine, Part 9

It is a beautiful Sunday morning. We just set the clocks back. The day we reverse daylight saving time is one of my favorites of the year. I get back that hour "they" stole from me in the Spring. I would love to spend most of the day outside but I have a shortage of days left to study for my CSW exam on Thursday. I think I need to tackle more than one subject today, so I am going to work on Spain and Portugal together. They are separate modules on the Society of Wine Educators' online Wine Academy so I will tackle them one at a time. I will have have three more wine regions to cover after the Iberian peninsula, Italy (shouldn't be a problem), the United States (could be a problem), and California (should be a problem, and I am saving it for last). If you want to read the first post in this series click here.

I started with Portugal. I took the pre-test and did very poorly. There were 23 questions and I answered 8 of them incorrectly scoring an embarrassing 65.2%. Looks like I need some work here. Let's see what I got wrong.

Portugal

It was common practice to fortify wines in the 18th century with about 3% of neutral grape spirits. This was to prevent microbial spoilage and to keep the wine stable. England went to war with France in the 1600's and Portugal became England's country of choice in regards to wine. Until this time most wines fortified were dry and it wasn't until the 1800's that sweet wines were fortified, essentially giving birth to Port and Madeira as we know it today.

The cadastro is a rating system that awards vineyards ranks of A,B,C,D E or F with A being the highest. These ratings also determine how much of the harvest will be made into port. The higher the rating the more port your vineyard can make.
 
The eight grapes recommended for port production by the Casa do Douro, which is one of Port's governing bodies are: Touriga Nacional, Touriga Francesa, Tinta Barroca, Tinta Roriz, Tinta Cão ( red varieties) and Gouveio, Malvasia Fina, Viosinho (white varieties).

About  50% of the wine produced in the Douro is made into Port. The same grape varieties that are used to make Port are used to make the area's unfortified table wines. The Douro region is broken into three sub-regions. From west to east: Baixo Corgo, Cima Corgo and Douro Superior (this eastern region has the highest quality and only produces about 15% of all Port production).

The Douro was delineated as an official zone of production in 1756 by Portugal's, Prime Minister at the time, the Marquis de Pombal. This makes the Douro one of the oldest delimited wine regions in the world.

The Estremadura is Portugal's largest wine producing region. This area is largely on the coast and has a maritime climate. The area reaches from Lisbon in the south to Bairrada in the north.

Esgana Cão is the same grape as Sercial from Madeira.

The most widely planted grape on the Island of Madeira is Tinta Negra Mole. While this grape is the most common on the island it makes the least consequential wines. It is also the main grape in the southern most region of Portugal, Algarve.

The regions of Portugal from North to south:

• Vinho Verde - Despite the name, more red is made here. Largest area by geographic size.
  
• Tras-os-Montes - Means behind the mountain. It lies between the Padrela mountains and Spain.
  
• Douro - Tinta Francesa most widely planted grape. Where port comes from.
  
• Bairrada - Vineyards destroyed in 1756 in effort to keep port undiluted and preeminent .
  
• Dão - Primary grape the Touriga Nacional
  
• Estremadura - Largest production of wine comes from here. May now be known as Lisboa.
  
• Bucelas - White wine area, grapes are mostly Arinto and Esgana Cao
  
• Colares - Phylloxera free. Ramisco principle red grape.
  
• Carcavelos - Fortified wine region.
  
• Ribatejo - Second highest in wine production.
  
• Setúbal - Famous for its Moscatels.
  
• Alentejo - Half of the world's cork supply comes from here.
  
• Terras do Sado - Has a warm maritime climate. Aragonez (Tempranillo) is one of the main red grapes.
  
• Algarve - Also known for cork production. Tinta Negra Mole is the principle red grape.
  
• Madeira - 390 miles off the coast. Fortified wines made from Bual, Sercial, Malvasia andVerdelho are best.
  

I took the post-test and scored 100%. I feel a little shaky here nonetheless.I think I will take a break, go outside and split some wood. When I come back, on to Spain.

I took the pre-test for Spain which consisted of 25 questions I answered 4 incorrectly and scored an 84%. Over all, I am fairly happy with that result. I am certainly more satisfied with these results than my initial results from Portugal. I am going to focus on the questions I got wrong.

Spain

The Tempranillo grape doesn't have a strong or very distinctive character and is usually blended with other varietals that display stronger aromas and flavors. It ripens earlier than most other red varieties in Spain.

Albariño has, according to the Wine Academy online study guide, a peachy and distinctive aromatic signature that is comparable to Viognier from France. I have had a fair amount of Albariño and, while not claiming to be an expert on the grape, have never noticed any similarities between the two.

Navarra's traditional red wine grape is the Garnacha, but Tempranillo is becoming the principal red grape. There are also new plantings of Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. Longer fermentation times are being used to create fuller, deeper wines and more producers are using barricas (60 gallon barrels made of French oak).

Priorat has vineyards that are terraced, cool, and slow ripening, have an unusual soil that retains moisture and produce low yields of concentrated grapes.

The main areas of wine making in Spain are:

• Ebro River Valley - Rioja, Navarra, Carinena, Somontano
  
• Duero River Valley - Ribera del Duero, Rueda and Toro
  
• Catalunya - Penedès, Priorat
  
• Galicia - Rias Baixas (Albariño)
  
• Central Spain - La Mancha, Valdepenes, Valencia (Levante Region) 
  

I found it odd that the Spain section online did not discuss Sherry at all.

I took the post-test and scored 100%. I feel pretty good about the Iberian peninsula. Four more days until the exam.

(images from viniportugal, wines of spain)