Omlet

Omlet is Telmo spelled backwards, and the wine works the same way: a Spanish hand on a Portuguese valley. Telmo Rodríguez wanted to make a wine in the Douro. Niepoort likes to try different approaches to different terroirs. The idea was to let Telmo's gentle way of making wine show.

The fruit comes from two old vineyards in the Covas valley, on schist at about 500 metres, facing east. The vines are 60 to 80 years old. Touriga Franca and Tinta Roriz come first, with Sousão, Alicante Bouschet and other varieties in the mix.

The grapes were picked by hand in September. The earlier editions fermented in wood; the 2011 fermented in stainless steel. Malolactic followed in barrels and old wooden vats, and the wine stayed in them for 18 months.

2011 was a dry year in the Douro that ended well. The Symington family's harvest report, written from its own quintas, describes rainfall far below average until late August, when an Atlantic storm arrived just in time. The weeks of picking that followed were dry and clear, and Paul Symington called it a good and very possibly a great year.

Niepoort bottled the 2011 in May 2013 and counts 6,750 bottles. That makes it the largest of the three editions the house lists.