Austria’s Lenz Moser to launch wine from Portugal at ProWein

Austrian Gruner Veltliner specialist Lenz Moser is unveiling the results of a new project at ProWein next week: his first wine from Portugal.

The result of a tie-up with Pedro Ribeiro, who is the co-owner and winemaker at Herdade do Rocim in the Alentejo region, Moser will be showing the new wine at Ribeiro’s stand in the Portuguese section of ProWein, which opens its doors on Sunday.

The wine, which is called Ribeiro & Moser, is made entirely from Arinto, a native Portuguese grape that yields high acid grapes, and produces long-lived white wines, including oak-aged examples.

Moser told db on Wednesday this week that he had “fallen in love” with Arinto two years ago when he started working with the variety in partnership with Ribeiro.

Commenting that he had not intended to launch a label from Portugal, he said that he had been introduced to Ribeiro and the wines of Herdade do Rocim through “a friend of a friend”.

Continuing he said, “I’m super happy with this relationship [with Ribeiro] and with the wine,” adding, “Anyway, I love the country, Portugal is a cool country.”

However, he said that he was not intending on launching any further joint-venture wine projects, telling db that his aim is to “consolidate – Portugal was already not in the plan.”

Moser, aside from his Austrian wines from his own winery, Weinkellerei Lenz Moser, makes wine in China and Hungary – with Chateau Changyu and Mad Wine respectively – while he produces an additional Austrian Gruner Veltliner with Markus Huber, called New Chapter.

Speaking further about Ribeiro & Moser, he said that the Arinto hails from the Lisboa region and has been packaged in the lightest bottle available in Portugal, which weighs 400 grams.

Commenting on the bottle, which was used to make the project more sustainable, he said, “The buyers should like it, although I’m not sure the consumer will be happy.”