Volcanic Vineyards · Vinho do Pico
Vinho do Pico (Verdelho do Pico)
🌋
Photo coming soon
The vines grow in thousands of tiny rectangular plots called currais, walled in by hand-stacked black volcanic rock — a UNESCO-listed landscape so labor-intensive that some plots hold only a handful of vines, and Russia's Tsar Nicholas II was reportedly a devoted fan of the wine it produced.
Vinho do Pico is a mineral, saline white wine made mostly from Verdelho grapes grown directly in volcanic soil on Pico Island, protected from Atlantic winds by low basalt walls. It's crisp and distinctly briny, tasting of the ocean that surrounds it.
Why it's made this way: Pico's 15th-century settlers had almost no fertile soil to work with, so they built thousands of stone-walled currais over lava rock to grow vines — a landscape unique to this Azorean island and recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2004.
More from Portugal
Part of World of Street Food — 690 dishes from 118 countries.
Something wrong here? Tell us in the comments below.
Photo credits.