Folias de Baco Uivo Renegado Pet Nat 2022

The Land

Most Portuguese pet nat comes from the cool, rainy northwest around Vinho Verde. This one comes from the Douro. The difference is height. Tiago Sampaio farms the plateau around Alijó and Sanfins do Douro in the Cima Corgo, north of the river at 500 to 700 meters, on soils that mix granite with schist. The Renegado fruit comes from old field plantings where red and white varieties grow side by side, the way Douro families planted before single-variety blocks became the norm. That mix of colors in one vineyard, plus the cool nights of the high ground, is what gives this sparkling wine from the Douro its pale color and bright acidity rather than the dark, heavy fruit of the valley floor.

The Wine

The Uivo PT Nat Renegado 2022 is a field blend of more than 20 varieties, split roughly evenly between red and white grapes, hand-harvested and fermented together. A brief spell on the skins gives it a light red color and a touch of tannic grip. Fermentation finishes in the bottle, the pétillant naturel method, and the wine is left undisgorged, so it pours slightly cloudy with its lees and a gentle fizz, at 11 to 11.5% alcohol. The 2022 season was brutal across the Douro: roughly 70% less rain than normal from November through August, a July heat wave that hit 47°C at Pinhão, and the earliest harvest anyone there can remember. Wild strawberry, cherry, pink grapefruit and a little guava, an herbal edge, and a dry, tangy finish.

The People

Tiago Sampaio made his first Pet Nat in 2014, when almost nobody in Portugal bottled wine that way on purpose. Sparkling wines now make up around 40% of what Folias de Baco produces, and his US importer, Grossberg/Kopman Selections, credits him as one of the first in the country to make Pet Nat at commercial scale. The name Renegado fits. It is the line where Tiago stopped following Douro convention, reviving the red-and-white co-ferments that farming families once made for their own tables, a style Portuguese call palhete. He came to it with serious training, agricultural engineering at Vila Real and rootstock research at Oregon State, and he farms the family's old vineyards organically. The Uivo range is built on low alcohol, minimal intervention and freshness from altitude, and Renegado is its most playful bottle.

Food Pairing

A light, fizzy red with this much acidity wants salt and fat. Grilled sardines with coarse salt on charred bread, the Portuguese street-festival classic, is the place to start: the bubbles scrub the oil and the red fruit stands up to the char. Chorizo and potato tacos with pickled red onion pick up the cherry and the herbal edge. A board of saucisson, pork rillettes and cornichons works for the same reason. And a pepperoni pizza straight out of the box may be the best match of all. This is the bottle to open at a backyard grill before anyone has decided what they want to drink.