Madeira Wine

 

“Madeira Wine’s festive and versatile flavors make it a perfect seasonal drink for December – find out from Olive’s wine expert which bottles to buy this Christmas.”

 

About Madeira wine

“… Madeira is a fortified wine, but it is produced in a unique way on the solitary island of Madeira, which lies some 320 miles off the west coast of Morocco. Discovered by the Portuguese in 1419, Madeira was established as a stopping point on transatlantic voyages, where ships stocked up on food, water and wine. The wine was fortified with rum produced on the island from the sugar cane that grew there to help preserve it during the voyage. As the ships crossed the tropics, the barrels of wine were exposed to oxygen and heat – normally the declared enemies of wine, but which instead transformed it into something very special.

Nowadays, heating takes place on the island itself, which makes the wine totally stable and gives it an almost indefinite shelf life, even after opening – I was lucky enough to taste a wine made in 1827, which still tasted incredibly vibrant and fresh.

Madeira’s four traditional “noble” grape varieties are sercial, verdelho, boal (also called bual) and malvasia (or malmsey), which are always made in dry, semi-dry, semi-sweet and sweet styles respectively. But the most widespread is the versatile tinta negra, used to make wood in all these styles and usually used for blended wines, rather than wines from a specific vintage. All have a distinct acidity that means even the sweetest are never cloying, and all have Madeira’s characteristic notes of dried fruit, nuts, caramel, candied citrus peel and soft, warm spices – the flavours of Christmas itself.”

 

 

See the full article on the Olive Magazine website.