Paulo Da Silva, “Casal da Azenha” Tinto

I have not been able to get the Colares wine region out of my head since I visited there a few years ago. That’s partly because magical wines like this one keep finding their way to me. It’s an incredible piece of luck, not just because of the COVID-induced global shipping meltdown but because so little wine is produced in the Colares area to begin with.The wine appellations along Portugal’s Atlantic Coast near Lisbon are some of the country’s (and the world’s) most historic, but beachfront development has mostly displaced viticulture in places such as Carcavelos, Bucelas and, most famously, Colares, where vineyards grow wild on the beach, willing their way down through layers of sand to burrow into the clay underneath. Today, we get a chance to experience this extreme terroir, and its trove of native grapes, thanks to 93-year-old António Bernardino Paulo da Silva, who continues a family winemaking tradition that dates back to 1898. While other Portuguese wine firms look for large trac