Grape variety
Touriga Nacional
Touriga Nacional, Portugal’s noblest red grape: its Dão origin, role in Port and the Douro, aromas and what to eat with it.
- Colour
- Red
- Origin
- Portugal, most likely the Dão (the Douro also claims it); a parent of Touriga Franca
- Main regions
- Douro, Dão, Alentejo; about 12,000 hectares, almost all in Portugal
- Typical aromas
- Blackberry, violet, bergamot; dense, firm tannin
- Classic pairing
- Roast lamb, kid, game, robust sheep’s cheese
- Synonyms
- Touriga, Mortágua, Tourigo do Dão
Touriga Nacional is regarded as Portugal’s noblest red grape. The OIV counted about 12,000 hectares in 2015, around six per cent of the Portuguese vineyard, and almost all of it lies in Portugal itself. Its home is not finally settled, but the name most often given is the Dão, an upland region south of the Douro: old names such as Tourigo do Dão and Mortágua point to that area. It became world-famous, however, in the Douro, in the blends for Port. The area was demarcated as early as 1756 by royal charter, and its steep schist terraces have been a UNESCO World Heritage site since 2001.
The vine is stingy: small bunches, tiny berries with thick skins and little juice, and yields among the lowest of any widely planted variety. In return the fruit is packed with extract: the wines are very dark, rich in tannin and long-lived. In the Douro it grows on schist, in the Dão on granite soils at several hundred metres above sea level, where the wines are usually somewhat fresher. Because yields are so small the grape is costly to grow, and its powerful tannins need time to settle.
Port is made by stopping fermentation with neutral grape spirit; part of the sugar remains and alcohol rises to 19 to 22 per cent. More than a hundred varieties are permitted in the Douro; Touriga Nacional is one of the five that shape the plantings, alongside Touriga Franca, Tinta Roriz, Tinta Barroca and Tinto Cão. It supplies colour, tannin and floral aromas that give Vintage Port its structure and longevity. Touriga Franca is a natural cross between it and Mourisco Tinto. Increasingly it also makes dry reds, in the Douro, the Dão and the Alentejo, on its own or blended with Tinta Roriz. In the hot, dry Alentejo, where Touriga Nacional is among the important red grapes, the wines are usually warmer and softer.
In the glass Touriga Nacional shows dark fruit, blackberry, with violet and a citrus note reminiscent of bergamot that the specialist literature associates with higher quality, carried by firm, dense tannin. At the table: roast lamb, oven-roasted kid, game and robust sheep’s cheese; a Vintage Port rich in Touriga Nacional is the classic companion of a blue cheese such as Stilton.