Before the brand, the winery and the ranges, there was a small vineyard in Muxagata and the desire to discover what it could give.
In 2007, Carloto Magalhães made a wine with grapes from the estate. He liked the result and invited five friends to taste it. In 2008, the six bought the property.
At the time there was no electricity in the winery. The wine was made in a shed lent by the neighbour at Canameira — the improvised beginning of a house that still prefers to grow at the pace of the vineyard.
Friendship stayed at the centre. Not as a campaign line, but as a way to decide, taste and share the work.
In 2008 there were 9.2 hectares. The other vines came later, at different altitudes and aspects: Vinha do Anacoreta, Vinha do Piloto and Canada da Moura.
The whites live down by the stream, where the air is cooler: they are the last to catch the morning sun and the first into afternoon shade. That delay helps preserve their acidity.
The name Palato began as a temporary solution and ended up staying. The first label was created by Mariana Castro Lemos and was built around two strong “P”s, the origin of the brand’s first visual identity.
On the Vinhas do Côa labels are the valley engravings: horses, aurochs and goats left on the schist by palaeolithic hands.
Built in 2012, the winery brought the wine to the heart of the estate. Temperature-controlled vats and a barrel room with controlled temperature and humidity allow precise work without losing the human touch.
French oak gives more elegant notes; American oak gives vanilla and caramel. The barrel room is kept between 75 and 80% humidity.
Cover crops protect the soil between the rows. The vineyard is not cleared with herbicide: during dormancy, sheep eat what has grown between the vines.
The reservoir, built in 2025, is the largest in Muxagata. It serves the vines through the most demanding periods and waters the animals.
Every grape comes from the estate. That is what keeps production normally between one hundred and one hundred and thirty thousand bottles a year — what the vineyard gives, and no more.
Carlos Magalhães, known in the trade as Carloto, graduated in Agricultural Engineering from the University of Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro in 1992. He made the estate’s first wine in 2007 and follows the vineyard, sets the winemaking direction and answers for the identity of each range.
A student of Carloto in 1995, he trained in oenology in Sauternes and worked four harvests in France. Since 2017 he has worked exclusively for Palato do Côa, coordinating viticulture and winemaking with Carloto and supporting the commercial side.
Welcoming people continues the story of the wine. A tasting happens with time, food and a view over the vines — the place where every bottle began.
