When we plan the agriculture of our estate and the subsequent processing of what the land provides us, one of the main values that guide our path and strategy is the concept of "genuineness." What do we understand by this concept? Quite simply, we design everything to express the most characteristic aspects of our estate and the natural place it occupies. For us, "genuineness" is about showing, through a simple food item that grew from the earth, all the characteristics of the place from which it comes. It's about expressing the soil, the amount of sun, rain, and wind experienced in a particular year. It's about expressing the spontaneous flowers that release essential aromas into the air. It's about expressing all the work that animal and microbial communities in the soil produce. It's about expressing the birds, squirrels, and wild boars that pass by and are essential to the entire food chain of this place. In short, expressing "genuineness" is expressing the purity of the place where we live.

For this compelling reason, we have adopted agriculture based on agroecological procedures that nourish the land in the best possible way, giving back to us rich and nutritious foods. We have decided to avoid adopting industrial agriculture methods that use and abuse the soil as if it were an infinite mine (which it is not), exploiting its nutrients to exhaustion, and killing all microbial life in the soil due to the use of pesticides. Instead, by adopting agroecological practices, we regenerate and nourish the entire foundation from which food comes—the soil.

"Genuineness" for us is, therefore, observing, respecting, and copying Nature. It is feeling the endo-climatic conditions we have and working with them as best as possible to protect our place. It is also following valuable traditions and abolishing those that do not respect the environment. In the specific case of our vineyards, we continue to plant vines in the old-fashioned way as local tradition dictates. We mix all grape varieties, white with red, not only as a tradition but also for an agroecological purpose, which is the enrichment of biodiversity and consequently strengthening the entire system against pests and diseases.

"Genuineness" is also understanding how the native forest works and trying to replicate its methods, even in less natural systems such as the vineyard. It is trying to transform the established monoculture as much as possible into polyculture because that's how the virgin forest is made. It is using all the free space we have, including the vineyard's borders, to plant diverse trees. It is bringing back to our place native trees that are considered lost in our region, such as the famous Portuguese oak.

And it's not just in understanding the land that the concept of "genuineness" should be taken into account. We must go further and extend this concept to the food processing facility. In our specific case, to the winery and to the mill. In the winery, we have to work with the wine using resources from the vineyard. Instead of sulfating the grapes to kill all microbial life and then inoculating selected yeasts for fermentation, we have to work with the yeast strains that live in the vineyards and are part of this entire ecosystem on our estate. These microbes are native and responsible for imparting specific flavors to the wine. So, what sense does it make to conduct fermentation with laboratory yeasts that any other wine producer, be it in Australia, Argentina, or even France, can use? Obviously, in this way, our wine will cease to be genuine, and instead of expressing the flavor and biodiversity of a place, it begins to express the taste and monoculture of a laboratory.

The same goes for the planted varieties. Portugal is fortunate to have around 300 native grape varieties that are mostly not found anywhere else in the world. Therefore, we must preserve this treasure and work with it to show how genuine our raw material is. So, why plant the same six usual grape varieties (Touriga Nacional, Touriga Franca, Tinta Roriz, Sousão, Gouveio, Viosinho, and Rabigato) and even some foreign ones in the Douro when we could be planting dozens of others, all native to our territory? This path of partial monovarietal specialization is leading part of the genuineness of our land to extinction. Farmers, who mostly follow trends, no longer care about old grape varieties, and so they begin to disappear.

The same goes for the olive oil we produce. It is all extra virgin, cold-pressed, made as naturally as possible, and with olives from three-hundred-year-old olive trees. Obviously, the production quantity will be smaller than if it were olive oil from an intensive monoculture olive grove. But "genuineness" is precisely that—tasting the flavor of a product that has gone through all its processing stages without losing its original characteristics, in favor of a strategy that favors quality over quantity.

All of this expresses the genuineness of a place and, consequently, of all the products that come from there.

by Tiago Cartageno
Owner of Quinta Vila Rachel