Producer: Bojo do Luar
Category: Wine - Still - Red
Grapes: Vinhão, Bastardo, Espadeiro, Borraçal, Arinto, and Loureiro
Region: Vinho Verde, Portugal
Alcohol by volume: 11.5%
Features: Organic
Notes
Field Blend of red (70%) and white (30%) grapes: Vinhao, bastardo, Espadeiro, Borraçal, Arinto, Loureiro, etc. Similar to our other popular wine Renegado but from Vinho Verde! The reds are very high in acid with a very short maceration of 5 days. Very simple, low-intervention, fermented with ground chestnut flowers to stabalize the process and 15g/l SO2 at bottling. This to me is a new category and class of wine that’s not red nor rosé, maybe it’s the old English “clairette” making a renaissance... who knows!
ABOUT THE PRODUCER
The Bojo do Luar project came to life during a trip Savio made to the Vinho Verde region. Here he met Fernando Paiva, a biodynamic producer who has been experimenting with adding ground chestnut flowers to the grapes and must before fermentation began. Meanwhile he’s halted using SO2 altogether since 2017.
Fernando is a regional reference for non-interventionist winemaking. He was the first Portuguese producer to acquire the DEMETER certification and through him Savio met another producer, Antonio Sousa, who practiced biodynamic viticulture, but still used traditional and conventional winemaking methods in the cellar.
Savio was undeterred and saw this as an opportunity: to use the traditional autochthonous varietals of Northern Portugal, and apply his knowledge and experience of many decades working with French producers, mainly in Burgundy and Loire. With Antonio’s winemaking experience and openness to experiment using a non-intervention approach in the cellar, the Bojo do Luar wines started to take shape. The region has a mostly cool temperate climate throughout Spring, then very warm days, and cool nights until the harvest in September. Five red grape varietals and three whites were chosen for their natural high levels of tartaric acids and low PH.
The parcels are located near the Tâmega river, with deep granitic soils and south-south-western exposure, not too far from where it empties into the Douro River. Each grape varietal was vinified separately in stainless steel and concrete. As stabilizer, one kilo of ground chestnut leaves was added per each ton of grape, before fermentation starts. There was minimal intervention throughout the entire process in the cellar. Once the blend for each wine was defined, only 10g/l of SO2 was added at bottling.