Madeira Press Kit - Associação de Promoção da Madeira

Madeira? Perhaps it was a combination of various factors which contributed towards the
new taste. Even today there there is is no no logical, logical, scientific scientific reason reason for for the the change change change from an
ordinary sweet table wine to Madeira wine as we know it. One thing is certain, however,
and that is that no other wine would put up with such rough rough ttreatment
t
reatment reatment. reatment Naturally,
people endeavoured to get round the necessity of transporting the wine over the equator
by trying out all sorts of alternatives, including some which were very strange. There is one
story which tells of a man who hung a barrel over the entrance to his office so that every
customer that came to visit him had to move it before entering. But even this simple and
original technique proved - fortunately for the customers one might add - not to work.
Thus the barrels were shipped shipped back and for forth for
th over over the the equator equator until 1794 when a
technique was discovered of artificially heating the wine in large ovens or wine wine hot hot
hot
houses houses, houses called estufas estufas estufas estufas in Portuguese.