Playful and Abundant: Duas Quintas Ramos Pinto Douro Red Blend

Wines of Portugal

We’ve got two wines left to go on our trip through some of the wines of Portugal.

All wine is personal. Whether a wine is award-winning or has 99 points doesn’t really matter if you don’t like it. Does the wine pair well with foods you like? And how does the taste and complexity of the wine change with those foods? This Portuguese red is a wine that is playful yet structured and one that is excellent with a variety of foods.

Duas Quintas Ramos Pinto Douro Red is a wine with a lot of character and it’s a bit chameleon-like. It’s got a dark, intense ruby red color with a fair amount of earthiness, spice and citrus. That’s because the two grape-producing regions here — Quinta de Ervamoira and Quinto dos Bons Ares — have dry winters, warm springs and cool summers. The result is that the grapes are plucked from the vines earlier than you might expect, retaining their full fruitiness.

What this means in the glass and at the table is that you can drink this wonderful red blend (it’s a blend of nine different varietals) by itself as an aperitif or with a wide variety of foods including pastas, risottos, nuts, foul, kid, pork and cheeses, such as sheep’s milk cheese. The wine is fresh and expressive, with just the right amount of soft tannins to make it interesting and to provide some structure. 

You get all of this at an extremely reasonable price — $8-12 a bottle online. Grab one if you see it, or two or more. When a wine pairs with so many food possibilities and doesn’t mind going solo, you won’t have a bottle of the Ramos Pinto on the shelf for long.