Arribas Wine Company Saroto Tinto 2023

Arribas Wine Company is a small, boutique winemaking project founded in 2017 by friends Frederico Machado and Ricardo Alves, based in the village of Bemposta in Mogadouro, right in the far northeastern corner of Portugal — Trás-os-Montes, literally "behind the mountains." Their vineyards sit on steep, granite-boulder-strewn hills overlooking the Douro river, just across from Spain's Arribes region — close enough, geographically and spiritually, that they named their project after it.

Both founders cut their teeth elsewhere before coming home: Frederico trained in Enology at UTAD and did harvests with Dirk Niepoort in the Douro, Susana Esteban in Alentejo, and stints in Oregon and Victoria, Australia, before he and Ricardo decided the time was right to build something of their own. Trás-os-Montes is one of Portugal's most overlooked wine regions — cold winters, high altitude, granite and schist soils, and a huge diversity of old, often-forgotten grape varieties (Tinta Gorda, Bastardo, Rufete, Verdelho and more). Arribas farms old, neglected vineyards traditionally and sustainably, with minimal-intervention winemaking, working to show the world what this remote, previously underestimated corner of Portugal can really do. 

Saroto Tinto is, for Frederico Machado and Ricardo Alves, an authentic "village wine" of Bemposta, in Mogadouro — a blend drawn from various small plots scattered throughout the village. It's an old-vine field blend built around roughly 70% red and 30% white indigenous varieties, including Tinta Gorda, Bastardo and Rufete, grown at altitudes of 550–700 metres on granite and schist soils that come through clearly in the finished wine.

The 2023 grapes were hand-harvested in the second week of September, in 20kg boxes, then foot-trodden whole-cluster (no destemming) in a traditional stone lagar. Fermentation happened spontaneously and without temperature control over 4 days, before pressing and transfer to used French oak, where both alcoholic and malolactic fermentation finished naturally. The wine then spent around 10 months ageing in barrel, followed by a further 5 months in stainless steel before bottling.

The result is a wine of high acidity and medium body, with a distinct mineral character reflecting its rocky, high-altitude terroir. 12% alc. Elegant, aromatic and juicy, with red berry fruit, wild herbs and a touch of iodine, finishing fresh with a distinctly Mediterranean character.

This wine is a natural product, not subject to filtration or fining, and may therefore develop sediment over time.