It’s gray with spots of rain in the forecast. Some could say it’s terrible weather for a vacation. We would say: perfect weather for day drinking! As it turns out, we have two port wine tastings scheduled today. We love it when plans and the weather align.
Our day started with a 50-minute walk across the river to a brunch place not too far from our tasting. We reserved for 12:30 and our tasting was at 14:30. With a rainy day the plan was to just chill at the restaurant and drink an extra coffee or two. The plan held until we sat down at 📍Basta Simple Brunch and looked at the menu. While the pictures of the food on Google Maps made it a promising place when we saw the menu included pasta and burgers, we knew that our experience might not be top tier. Karine had the eggs benedict and I went for a bacon avocado pancake. Both were OK. The coffee was from a super automatic coffee maker that could use a little extra care. Nothing to complain about, nothing to praise either. It was probably the world’s okayest brunch.
The brunch was done in a little over half an hour. Not wanting to spend an hour and a half there, we decided to walk 20 minutes to the south shore of the river and stop by 📍7g Coffee for proper coffee. With the walk back to our tasting being 30 minutes uphill, it left us about 20 minutes for coffee. As it’s important to the people of 7g to make proper coffee, two flat whites took almost all of our time there to arrive. We almost had to chug what was very good coffee and walk back up hill.
Our first port tasting turned out to be the classical tasting experience with a visit that you can have at any winery. A little speech about the history of the product, a second speech about the history of the winery, a walk through a row or two of barrels, a speech on how the barrels are taken care of and maybe a side piece on any other spirits made by the house. About half an hour later you’re sitting down for the tasting. I would not be surprised to find there’s an ISO standard for such an experience. 📍Poça delivered on the standard exactly. Their wine and port were delicious and the standard presentation somewhat informative. The charcuterie board with the obligatory pastel de nata was a good support for the high volume of alcohol. Our neighbours had the full port tasting with 3 tiny chocolate balls to soak up all that alcohol. Not sure I would have been able to do a second tasting on only that.
Done with our first tasting, we went back to the river shore and walked it a little. It is a prime convenience spot for visitors. You’ll find the stores with all the local “specialties” for the adventurous next to the Burger King and similar stores for the people craving something known. For us, we were there for the views of the north shore of Porto. We went back to 📍7g Coffee to balance out the alcohol. Our next tasting at 📍Quevedo was conveniently one street over.
Second tasting was somewhat outside of the ISO standard. Upon arrival we were sat at a bar table. Well… I say a table but it’s a barrel with a glass top and stools around it. Our first conclusion was that whoever decided on the standard barrel’s length did not take into account it being used as a table. It’s definitively too short for that usage. Within a minute or two of being sat, our host for the next hour sat down with his sampling bottles and started a conversation and class about port. Some of it was a recap from the previous show we got but coming from somebody with a master in history nuances were added, for example about the British originally being the top importer of Portugal wine. We were entertained for an hour, not entirely sure when to try the different ports in front of us with the food pairing (two cheeses and two chocolates). Overall, it was a better experience than the standard fare.
We concluded our day drinking walking back to our apartment with a quick stop at 📍Castro for the obligatory pastel de nata before sitting on the couch waiting for the rain to stop. Through out the day, we had rain but only while we were inside. Did it rain during our first and second tasting? Absolutely it did, while we were out and walking to coffee or to our day drinking experience? Nope. We only got rain heading home. We figured it was a fair price to pay to “have to” sit on our ass for a couple of hours enjoying sweet butter and cream pies.
Diner was at 📍Mito; a fancy spot, but our kind of fancy. The ambiance and style of the restaurant is casual but the food is where the fancy shines through. They work from the principle that all dishes you order are dishes to share with the rest of the table. As it is our default operating model when we order at any restaurant during our vacation (hence maximizing our opportunities for a great food experience) we were more than delighted. The food itself was brilliant and the wine offered by the glass also local and just perfect. On a side note, we learned that anything from the Douro valley is considered local in Porto even if the winery is 150km away.
We had a good time and with rain in the forecast tomorrow we may end up doing somewhat of a repeat of today. We’ll see…