Chryseia: A profile of Portugal’s icon wine and new releases

Founded in 1999 by Symington Family Estates (SFE) and Bruno Prats, former owner of Bordeaux’s Château Cos d’Estournel, Prats & Symington is the partnership through which the prestigious Port wine dynasty successfully forged a new path.

Fresh to making unfortified Douro DOC wine, Paul Symington, then joint-managing director, made no bones about the value of Prats’ ‘profound knowledge of turning outstanding fruit into one of the world’s greatest wines’. Meanwhile Prats was drawn by ‘the Symingtons’ priceless knowledge of the Douro’.

The goal? Proving that the Douro could produce top red wines to stand alongside the family’s leading Ports, including Graham’s, Dow, Warre’s and Quinta do Vesuvio.

French polish

Following a year of intensive trials, the partners’ (and Symington’s) first Douro DOC wine emerged in 2000. ‘D’Ouro’ means ‘golden’ in Portuguese, so they named it Chryseia, after the Greek for golden. Conceived in ‘the same spirit as a small Bordeaux château’, according to Prats, production is small and decidedly upmarket, hence the introduction of a second wine in 2002, when Chryseia was not made.

Post-Scriptum de Chryseia (P.S.) has been made every year since, alongside Chryseia, save for 2010, which was another light year, when no ‘Grand Vin’ (as Prats describes the top wine) was released.

Becoming one of its most sought-after wines, Chryseia has undoubtedly added lustre to the Douro region, which continues to attract distinguished Bordelais. They include Hubert de Boüard of Château Angélus and Philippe Nunes (at Poças) and ex-Pétrus man, Jean-Claude Berrouet (at Quinta da Boavista).

Strikingly, Prats preferred to invest, not consult because, he tells me: ‘I believe you work better when your own money is in risk.’ The investment has been considerable, with the acquisition of dedicated estates and construction of a bespoke winery, designed to produce wines of great finesse as opposed to Port wine, with its traditional focus on power and extract.

With finesse in mind, the wines focus on two leading varieties, Touriga Nacional and Touriga Franca, while vinification closely follows the Bordeaux method, with rigorous berry sorting, 100% de-stemming, temperature-controlled ferments in closed stainless-steel tanks (not open lagares) and long but gentle extractions. ‘What’s magic with Douro wine is the fruit,’ says Prats.

Unlike Cabernet Sauvignon, neither Touriga Nacional nor Touriga Franca accepts a high level of oak, so 400-litre French oak barrels are used, not Bordeaux’s 225-litre barriques. The lightness of touch is particularly evident in the consistently elegant, mid-weight P.S., which sees no new oak and has less skin maceration.

As for Chryseia, since introducing a little more extraction and press wine as confidence in its ageing potential grew, the Grand Vin spends around twice as long in oak (16 months) compared with early vintages which, according to Prats, ‘were made to be very seductive’ and seemed glossier, more international in style.

Sense of place

The biggest investment of all has been in the vineyards, with a migration from Quinta do Vesuvio and (Dow’s) Quinta do Bomfim in favour of Quinta da Perdiz in the Torto Valley (acquired in 2004) and, Chryseia’s backbone, Quinta de Roriz (mainly north-facing, acquired in 2009). The latter neighbours Quinta da Vila Velha (mainly west-facing), which is a minor but constant contributor to the blend.

The focus on these Cima Corgo vineyards, especially Roriz, with its mineral-rich soils that were once mined for tin, has amplified Chryseia’s sense of place. They give a powerful, rugged even, mineral-driven (dusty schistous) dry extract, sometimes saltiness.

Charles Symington, SFE’s head winemaker, says: ‘Roriz’s predominantly north-facing aspect (as opposed to Perdiz’s hotter west and south-west aspects) also favours superb freshness.’ Perdiz also gives wines ‘that have rich fruit and are intensely aromatic’; it is the primary source of P.S., though Charles believes Perdiz will make a greater contribution to Chryseia as new plantings mature.

2017: a classic vintage

Vintage expression plays a role too. Prats has described the formidable 2011 vintage – a classic Vintage Port year – as ‘more Douro style’ and the elegant 2012 vintage as ‘more Bordeaux in style’. Like 2011, the latest 2017 releases come from a classic Vintage Port year, albeit a rather different year.

Whilst 2011 has been described as a ‘stars aligned year’, 2017 was the second-driest year in the Douro and easily the hottest year of the last four decades. Thanks to an early start to the growing season, freshness was nonetheless well preserved in the earliest vintage on record.

This, coupled with 2017’s powerful, textural tannins, makes for an emphatically well-structured Chryseia. It is more backward than 2011 at the same stage.

Though similarly focused on the Tourigas (with a splash of Tinta Amarela), the Prats & Symington wines made for an interesting comparison with SFE’s Douro wines from Quinta do Vesuvio, one of Chryseia’s original sources.

Famous for its Port, this easternmost, north-facing Douro Superior estate’s wines (which made their debut in 2007) are darker and broader. From Vesuvio’s lower slopes, second wine Pombal do Vesuvio is sturdy, where P.S. is elegant. With Touriga Nacional from its higher reaches and Touriga Franca from lower slopes, top wine Quinta do Vesuvio 2017 is already accessible and expressive, contrasting with Chryseia’s gravitas and restraint.

The wines

Full tasting notes and scores of the 2017 wines by Sarah Ahmed – plus older vintages of Chryseia tasted and rated by Sarah Ahmed, Tom Cannavan (2008), Margaret Rand (2011) and Steven Spurrier (2015).