Restricted to holidaying during school breaks, our family pilgrimage to Portugal hangs in the balance because prices are three times higher in peak season. So an invitation to Portugal to review the country’s largest consumer wine fair in Porto: Essencia do Vinho (Essence of wine) and to help judge Portugal’s Top 10 wines, could not be ignored.
Meanwhile (and a little cruelly timed) back in the UK, London was playing host to the annual Wines of Portugal tasting. Normally a fail-safe fixture in my wine tasting calendar I like to visit for the energy, innovation and talent that you are guaranteed to find there. Energy and innovation might not be words you would think of to describe Portuguese wine (perhaps more so their football team) but for a number of years now Portugal has been chipping away at the psyche and taste buds of the UK wine trade and,
Vagabond Wines first came onto my radar as an oddly spacious wine shop near my office that had a large table inside and a series of enomatic wine machines to try before you buy. This hybrid format of wine retailing was pretty revolutionary back then so much so that every time I walked passed the place would be empty and I wondered how long it would last. That was 2010 in Fulham and the concept has not only survived but flourished and arguably influenced the flux of hybrid wine shops/bars that now exist arou