Adega Marel

Sub-region: Granja-Amareleja  

Address: Soc. Vitivinícola Courela dos Aleixos, Lda.

EN 385, km 21, 7885-012 Amareleja, Portugal

Owners/winemakers: Tiago Macena, David Morgado, Raúl Moreno-Yague

Email:  adega@adegamarel.pt 

Website: www.adegamarel.pt

A relatively new player, founded in 2018, Adega Marel is a cooperative venture driven by Dao-based winemaker Tiago Macena and Alentejo-based marketer/manager David Morgado, whose family own the original adega. More recently Seville-based winemaker Raúl Moreno-Yague has joined forces with them in a couple of interesting experimental wines.

Youthful and dynamic, the project is notable for its mix of traditional and modern winemaking techniques and cross-border collaboration. It is the first instance I know of where Spanish and Portuguese have explored winemaking together. 

Tiago Macena has been deeply involved in Portugal’s Dao wine region for years, having made wine for major players Casa de Santar and Boas Quintas as well as others in Douro, Bairrada and Australia. He is also studying for the Master of Wine exam, systematically broadening his wine knowledge on a global level.

Moreno-Yague is a very much a citizen of the world, having studied viticulture and winemaking in Australia and worked in Rioja, Jerez, Burgundy, Douro, Istria, South Africa and Georgia, the origin of qvevri clay pot wine making. He brings an Andalusian perspective from just across the border in Jerez, having made wine in Tinaja clay pots, the Spanish counterpart to talha. 

David Morgado provides the place to make the wine and, more importantly, extensive roots back into Alentejo’s Granja-Amareleja subregion with family, ancestry and friends deeply woven into the fabric of the local talha culture. 

A key figure is Morgado’s grandfather, António, after whom they named their traditionally made Tonico Vinho de Talha DOC range, Tonico being António’s nickname among close friends. An accomplished ‘modern’ winemaker, now turned apprentice, Macena warmly credits António as the first person to teach - indeed, continues to advise - him how to make traditional talha wine. 

António’s influence was the key to unlocking local talha culture. As they got to know António better, they also met his friends, who proudly showed them their vineyards and their talha in turn. Gradually this community came to accept the newer generation and became a natural source of fruit, talhas and knowledge as the project grew in size and depth over time.  

The adega owns 14 hectares of vines, all traditional local varieties, some in mixed field blends and others more focused on a single variety or two. These are in several smaller parcels on different soil types, each named after the local families or old friends they bought them from. Two of these parcels are old vineyards, and one, Pura, is very old, dating from before 1930. 

Those of us outside of farming often don’t realize how important the passing on of ownership and stewardship of land is to a traditional villager. Men who have devoted their life tending a small plot have a huge emotional investment in seeing it well cared for after they move on. Respectful continuity is clearly something the young team at Adega Marel value. 

Originally, Adega Marel started off with three family owned talha and now draws wine from thirteen, all locally manufactured. Similar to vineyards, the old talha are nicknamed after Antonio’s old friends, former owners and the talha’s characteristics: Preta 500Kg, Cruzeiro (dated 1800) 600kg, Bancaleiro 1000Kg, Barriga Cheia (full tummy) 800 kg, Mal-Talhado 800 kg, Chico 200kg, 3 Gatos (3 cats) 300kg, Charuto (cigar shaped) 500Kg, Comissário (Policeman) 800 kg, Patrício 1400 Kg, Arnega 500 kg, Mal-Talhado 2 700 kg, Chico Açorda 650 Kg. 

Adega Marel’s blend of traditional talha and vineyards and more modern technology plays out through several wine styles. The adega’s ‘modern’ styled wines are conventionally made from local grapes in stainless steel tanks. The Marel (a top breeding stud sheep or goat) range is focused on capturing the vineyard’s character: fresh, fruit-focused and easy drinking. An evolutionary hybridized departure from this is Marel’s Illustre, which ferments and then ages the wine in stainless steel until February 2021, thereafter maturing for another four months in talha. The clay’s porosity works like an oak barrel to soften tannins.  

A step up in quality from Marel, Manolito is named after David Morgado’s great uncle, an extroverted, much loved character who traveled widely, promoting Amareleja wherever he went and returning with colorful stories enthusiastically shared with the folks back home. This hybrid style blends both talha-made and stainless steel-produced wines together, creating something fuller bodied and more complex, with savory edged fruit. It works as an introduction to talha wines, bridging Marel’s fruit focus and the purer, more traditional textural experience of Tonico’s DOC style. I found these to be really interesting wines that honestly tracked the ups and downs of vintage variation, illustrating the seasonal interaction between land and grapes and sun. 

Rethinking ancient technology - outside the box - is also part of the ethos at Adega Marel. The Spanish branch of this threesome, Raúl Moreno-Yague, has brought some intriguing new ideas drawn from the outer edges of both the New World and the Ancient World of wine. Combining Georgian techniques he learned at Okro Wines and Pheasant Tears, with squeaky clean Australian practices from university days, he invented a novel approach towards a lighter, more controlled gentle extraction in talha.  After foot treading grapes into a paste, this was placed into mesh bags inserted into talha and then submerged with weights to keep it all under a liquid surface. 

Pretty clever stuff. The result is more fruit intensity, less astringent tannins and more finesse, plus less oxidation and avoidance of vinegary, volatile acidity (VA). One can imagine this may also alter the convection flow inside the talha as well. 

The technique is employed on the so far unnamed cross border collaboration between Adega Marel & Moreno-Yague, involving early picked, acid sharp Rabo de Ovelha (Sheep’s tail) with old vine Antão Vaz and Roupeiro (adding structure and complexity) fermented in talha and thereafter aged in 100-year-old, 800-liter, Amontillado (Sherry) Chestnut Barrels. The barrels add less astringent tannins than oak, and being more porous, develop wine more quickly. Moreno-Yague observes that, “an Amontillado cask delivers layers of saltiness, ‘Sotolon’ and roasted nuts & seeds.” I also picked up hints of interesting  ‘rancio’ nuttiness leached out of Sherry residues in these old barrels. The style is unlike anything I’ve tasted from anywhere, truly something new.  

All in all, this project is in the process of exploring an intriguing mix of ancient and cutting-edge practice. On one hand respectfully replicating old styles, while busily spinning out entirely new concepts of wine. Although still early days, there is promise of some pretty amazing creativity emerging.