Vinho do Fogo

Vines on an active volcano

Pico do Fogo, at 2,829 metres, is the highest point in Cabo Verde and its only active volcano, Lusa reports. Chã das Caldeiras lies in its crater, and the village itself dates only from the early twentieth century. The Chã winemaker David Montrond told Forbes África Lusófona that the vines grow in volcanic basalt soil from about 800 metres upwards.

How vines reached Fogo is told two ways. Punch, citing Wine-Searcher, repeats the story of Manuel Montrond, a Frenchman bound for Brazil who stayed on the island and planted the vines he was carrying, making a sweet red wine called Manecom. Forbes África Lusófona says instead that the first vines are thought to have been brought by the Portuguese in the seventeenth century.

A cooperative and its rebuilding

Bottling of Fogo wine began in 1998, through a project of the Italian non-governmental organisation COSPE that encouraged growers to work as a cooperative, Forbes África Lusófona reports. Chã, which that magazine calls the oldest wine brand in the region, comes as white, red and rosé, with a sparkling wine in pilot trials in 2025. Lusa reported more than a hundred small growers in 2021, with the cooperative receiving practically all the grapes grown in the crater. In 2019 it made 50,000 litres, half the usual amount in a rainy year, three-quarters of it white.

Lava has twice destroyed the cooperative’s winery. The eruption that began in November 2014 and, Lusa notes, ended in February 2015 swallowed fields, houses, a school and the headquarters of the natural park, as well as the winery, according to Forbes África Lusófona, while Punch reported at the time that the vineyards were lost too. A new winery was built after the eruption. It can process six tonnes of grapes a day and, after investment of about 5.5 million euros, produces around 100,000 litres a year for a cooperative of 85 members.

Not all of Fogo’s wine comes from the crater. In 2009, Forbes África Lusófona says, an Italian non-governmental organisation linked to the Capuchin order set up an irrigated 25-hectare vineyard at lower altitude, in the municipality of São Filipe. Its Maria Chaves wines, made at the Monte Barro winery, have been on sale since 2013, with much of the output exported to Italy.

In the glass

According to David Montrond, the main grapes are alfrocheiro for the red and sabro branco, a variety close to moscatel, for the white. He describes the white as one to drink chilled, with citrus notes and minerality, and the red as intense, with red fruit and around 14 per cent alcohol. Expresso das Ilhas, in a 2017 guide to local gifts, described the Chã red as dark red to purple, soft and velvety and aromatic, recalling wild berries, and suited to meat dishes.

Manecom is another wine of the island. Turismo de Cabo Verde calls it a well-kept secret of the people of Chã das Caldeiras, made in sweet and dry versions.

Recognition

In 2021 the Cape Verdean researcher Maria Teixeira presented what Lusa described as the first physico-chemical and microbiological study of Chã wine, a master’s thesis. It concluded that the wine is of good quality and that the reds have more antioxidant capacity than the rosés, and the rosés more than the whites. Forbes África Lusófona lists gold medals at the international Extreme Wines competition in Italy for two wines of the Maria Chaves winery in 2018 and for Chã Branco 2021 in 2023, and Turismo de Cabo Verde says the wines of Fogo are recognised by experienced winemakers.

In Emblem World, Vinho do Fogo sits in the Cabo Verde drink collection with grogue and ponche, where people discover and rate local drinks.