Portugieser or Blauer Portugieser, black grape variety common in both senses of that word in both Austria and Germany, its name suggesting completely unsubstantiated Portuguese origins. The vigorous, precocious vine is extremely prolific, easily producing 120 hl/ha (almost 7 tons/acre), thanks to its good resistance to coulure, of pale, low-acid red that, thanks to robust enrichment, can taste disconcertingly inconsequential to non-natives.
Blauer Portugieser is synonymous with dull, thin red in lower austria, where it is particularly popular with growers in Pulkautal, Retz, and the Thermenregion. It covers about 1,500 ha of vineyard and is the country’s third most planted dark-berried vine variety after zweigelt and blaufränkisch. Such wines are rarely exported, with good reason, and are only rarely worthy of detailed study.
