Infantado Palhete Rojo 2023

75% native red varieties/25% white varieties. From a single hectare of 40-year-old vines: a field blend of red and white varieties, planted at almost 2000 feet in elevation on a schistous, north-facing hillside in the Douro. The bunches are co-harvested by hand and partly destemmed. The mix of berries and whole clusters macerates for about a week. Fermentation is spontaneous with indigenous yeasts in stainless steel tank, where the wine is also aged on its fine lees for 11 months, followed by a year in bottle. The name of a legal category of Portuguese wine, "Palhete" is Portuguese for the British term "claret" (from the French "clairet" originally), historically applied to the pale, not-quite-red wines of Bordeaux wines way back in the 14th-15th centuries (only later did claret come to indicate the bigger, truly red, more modern style of Bordeaux red). 170-case production.