Soalheiro: top class everyday drinking

'Soalheiro' means 'sunny', and it's what João António Cerdeira christened the vineyard he was planting in 1974; the plot was exposed to the sun all day long. João was doing something new. Hitherto in this part of northern Portugal along the Spanish border, vines had been marginal. They would be planted in a hodgepodge of varieties, lining fields of other crops. But now, João was giving a single grape variety a whole, prominent field to itself. In time, the results would be spectacular. 

João had planted Alvarinho. Just across the Minho river in Spain, it's called Albariño; either way, it's the most favoured white grape variety in the north-western Iberian Peninsula. Its combination of steely acidity and stonefruit flavours lends itself to wines that are ripe and vigorous, and very often irresistible. Fifty years on since that original vineyard, Soalheiro is a remarkably successful family business; their Alvarinho is very often Portugal's best.

There aren't a lot of wines we like enough to ship a whole pallet - but this time we have. The combination of concentration and energy in their 2023s betokens wines that are fabulous now, but which will also intensify over the next few years. And they come in at an everyday price point. At the core of the range, the 2023 Alvarinho is all peach and lemon, with a salty, mineral finish. The Granit cuvée comes from high altitude vineyards and is very different, much more about lime and linearity. Also from a high altitude vineyard, Terramatter is a low-intervention Alvarinho raised in a mixture of chestnut barrels and concrete eggs; it offers an intense burst of lemon and lime and a waxy, leesy texture. Soalheiro also make a fabulous sparkling wine; the Espumante Bruto is a dry, sparkling Alvarinho, salty and crisp, and the pale Rosé has a touch of strawberry fruit from the blending in of Touriga Nacional. We'll have the whole range on tasting tomorrow from noon-6pm in our Copthall Avenue store. /NT