Fonseca

Fonseca is a well-regarded port house that produces quality wines and is known for the lush, exotic style of its vintage port releases. Encompassing three quintas (vineyard estates) across the Douro region, the house makes a variety of port styles, ranging from the reserve ruby, Bin 27, to white ports and Tawny ports of various ages.

Fonseca's vintage releases are the most notable, however, and several vintages have attracted 100-point ratings and glowing reviews from major wine critics. In years deemed not good enough for the top port, an earlier-drinking label called Guimaraens Vintage is released.

The three quintas, or vineyard estates, are located in the Cima Corgo (above the Corgo River and its confluence with the Douro), around the town of Pinhão. The Cima Corgo is the more central region, located between the Baixa (lower) Corgo to the west, closer to Porto, and the Douro Superior, which stretches to the border with Spain.

Two of the quintas, Quinta do Cruzeiro and Quinta de Santo António, are in the Pinhão Valley and have supplied Fonseca with grapes for over a century. The former is associated with providing a tannic backbone and dense black fruit to the vintage port, while the latter estate provides aromatic complexity.

Quinta do Panascal in the Távora Valley is a newer purchase (it was acquired in 1978) and gives rich, jammy flavors and texture. It is also the source for the Single Quinta Vintage wine that bears its name.

Fonseca was founded in 1815 by the Fonseca and Monteiro families, with the Guimaraens family taking over during the second half of the 19th Century. In 1949, the company was sold to Taylor, Fladgate & Yeatman which had loaned Fonseca considerable sums since the outbreak of war in 1939.