This month FTLOP is proud to introduce you to Xito Olazabal who
is the wine and Portmaker at the historic property of Quinta do
Vale Meão, originally owned by Dona Antonia Adelaide Ferreira.
Xito also makes the wine at his cousin’s property at Quinta do
Vallado. It was Xito, that talked his father Vito, into going it
alone in the late 1990′s and they went from grape growers to
wine producers.  Here is Xito’s story:  Xito Olazabal1. How did
you break into the Porto and Douro wine trade and at what age?
When I was a kid my father took me frequently to Ferreira and I
was fascinated by everything: my grandfather Fernando at the
tasting room, the machines in the lab, the big old wooden vats,
the bottling machine, love to ride the fork lift, the tunnels
with lots of spider webs and the smells.  I took part in my
first vintage at Ramos Pinto when I was 15 years old and since
then I have never missed one. So it was a natural thing to study
enology at Vila Real University (UTAD). I started to work
officially in 1993 a