There is a moment of drama at Amphora Day, staged every year on or soon after St Martin’s Day (11 November), the celebration of the harvest, at Herdade do Rocim’s stylish adobe-built winery in Beja in the south of the Alentejo.
That moment is the ceremonial tapping of the talha – inserting a tap into the plugged hole near the base of a traditional Alentejano clay talha – and drawing off the first of the clear wine as it filters through...
