Quinta do Vale Meao, Meandro, Vinho Tinto

Stunning wine: this is lush, smooth, rich, complex, dark, round and never cloying with a long and balanced finish. A wonderful blend of traditional varieties with the addition of the curious Alicante Bouschet, it is a bolt of a reminder as to the quality of dry red wines available in the Douro.

Made in a hybrid of modern and very traditional manners, the grapes arrive at the winery in separate batches, one variety at a time, which is unusual in the Douro, but they are then crushed by foot for four hours, in time-honoured tradition. Each batch of each variety is then fermented separately in stainless steel tanks and then aged in French barriques (that's modern) but none of the barrels are new (that's old). The individual lots are then blended and this superb wine is made. The proportion of the blend varies from vintage to vintage but the grapes used are Touriga Nacional, Touriga Franca, Tinta Roriz, Tinta Barocca and Alicante Bouschet. Quite amazingly, given its quality, this is the second wine of the estate as it has a bigger brother, the Quinta do Vale Meao.

This estate has a very rich and illustrious history as it was established under the direction of Antónia Adelaide Ferreira, who was immensely powerful and influential in the Port industry and therefore the whole of the Douro region. She planned a winery that took eight years to complete, with granite lagars for grape crushing and a comprehensive vineyard strategy. Still in her family's hands, this is one of those lovely stories of history and invention, development and awareness of context that present such a satisfying narrative in wine regions across the globe.

There are lots of great things about the Douro: its amazing geological position and relationship to the river, with incredible steep terraces of vineyards; its equally steeped history as one of the earliest legally demarcated regions in the world of wine; and the respect that its wines have had for centuries. This wine is a product of all of these facets of the region and is a superb ambassador for the region and even its name is from the place; the river winds and bends in a particularly varied manner right in the middle of Vale Meao's seventy hectares of vines, truly a meandering point if ever there was one.