In keeping with our habit of challenging the Members to put their cars out of hibernation in the first quarter of the year, we have proposed the discovery of Carcavelos DOC ‘Villa Oeiras’ wine for the morning of the MGCP's AGM – Annual General Meeting.
This centuries-old fortified wine has been restored and has been produced by the Municipality of Oeiras since 2006 at the Adega do Casal da Manteiga, using grapes harvested from the surrounding vineyards.
The wine is from Carcavelos and, like Porto, Moscatel and Madeira, it is one of the few national fortified wines and the one with the smallest demarcated region in the country. Stretching from Paço de Arcos to São João do Estoril, it covers the two municipalities of Oeiras and Cascais. With an area of 25 hectares, it is shared roughly half and half between the two.
The wine is Atlantic, white and generous because it is mostly fortified with the famous Lourinhã brandy, which gives it a honey colour. Grown in limestone soils, there are 3 white grape varieties that determine the uniqueness of this wine. Arinto, which predominates in the country, Galego Dourado, which is the most representative and also present in Setúbal and Colares, and Ratinho, an indigenous variety that allows the product to ‘age well’. It's in the 15-year ageing in Portuguese and French oak that it gains its complex notes and velvety texture.
The history of this wine dates back to the reign of King José I, in 1752, when its fame and tasting reached the court in Beijing, enchanted Shakespeare and led Thomas Jefferson, the 3rd President of the USA, to consider the Adega do Palácio do Marquês de Pombal to be one of the most advanced in Europe.
In fact, while the Adega do Casal da Manteiga was na old stable, the Adega do Palácio do Marquês de Pombal, designed by Carlos Mardel, was intended to be a monumental building adorned with the busts of Roman emperors and, at the time, was considered the largest in the region to serve as a granary and cellar with a capacity for 900 barrels.
Always in the company of the Specialist Wine Tourism expert Catarina Silva, we began the visit to the vineyards and the production cellar and ended up at the Adega do Palácio where we tasted the olive oil, along with the Carcavelos Villa Oeiras, which is aged for 7 years in wood, and the Villa Oeiras Superior, which is aged in barrels for 15 years. To complete the experience, the more expensive Villa Oeiras Colheita could be bought in the shop.
After lunch, the AGM was held at the Club's headquarters, where the new Social Bodies for the 2025 - 2026 biennium were elected by electronic vote.
