Deep thinking on Port

We die hard, us port drinkers. From Park Lane to the park bench, port is the only nightcap for millions like us who think about what we drink, even if that thought is only in our subconscious mind. Summer is just drawing to a close and already the sharp clink of little glasses is starting to punctuate the end of an evening’s dining, or else to herald the start of a long night.

For port is undoubtedly a drink of the night. The earlier the sunset, the greater, I am certain, the volume of port we Australians consume. Speaking as one susceptible to the odd weekday lunch out, I find it difficult to accept a port after dessert unless as an act of total and unconditional surrender of the afternoon’s effectiveness. But when taken after ten at night, port flows as the very the essence of why people enjoy wine.

Port is warm, spiritous, mellow and frequently sweet. It must be taken slowly, for otherwise it will snap back and bite. Port tastes of the memories of old wines enjoyed. Yet fine port has the freshness and vitality to provoke imaginings of wines yet to be opened.

Although port is one of the traditional Australian wines, it did not originate here. ‘Port’ was the name given by those notorious English to the fortified wines they shipped from the Portuguese harbour town of Porto or Oporto, at the mouth of the Douro River, from whose improbably hostile slopes comes the finest of that country’s wine.

Fortification, or brandying, is the simple addition of alcohol to wine, and was introduced in Portugal around the turn of the eighteenth century. The higher alcoholic strengths preserved the local wines against oxidation and spoilage encountered on their sea voyage to England, although it did inevitably create a completely new style of wine. We continue the practice today not so much because we need the protection, but because we like what it does to the wine, and what the wine does to us.

Tawny ports are by far the most common, and they are what you will usually be served if you ask for a port in a restaurant or bottle shop. They range in stature from the Royal Reserves how did they get the ‘royal’ in there? to the old Grandfather Ports of Penfolds, the stuff of legends. A tawny port is named after its colour; an archaic reddy-brown, giving it the corrosive appearance of a rusting iron gate. Don’t be deceived, for the oldest and best really look the part.

Those ports with the oldest average age justifiably command the highest prices. Many of the best are fortified with the addition of undiluted and mature brandy rather than with neutrally-flavoured fortifying spirit.

Many of the sweeter and richer ports are described as ‘liqueur’ port, although they are not strictly liqueurs at all. The ‘liqueur’ refers to the concentration effect of prolonged barrel maturation in a warm part of the cellar, possibly near the top of a corrugated iron ceiling.

Some affordable tawny ports of real quality are the Penfolds 10 Year Old, Stonyfell Old Lodge and the Yalumba Clocktower, younger offspring of the highly regarded Yalumba Galway Pipe. Towards the premium end are the delightfully mature Stanton and Killeen Old Tawny Port, Seppelt’s Para Liqueur Port and Baileys’ Glenrowan Tawny Port, aged and spirity with delightfully penetrative mellow, figgy fruit.

Slightly drier, more elegant ports made in the lighter and more spirity Portuguese mould include the Lindemans Bin RF 1 Tawny Port, Saltram’s Mr Pickwick Port, the much cheaper McWilliams Hanwood Port strictly a little too fruity for this bracket and Penfolds Grandfather Port, patriarch of the style. If I had to name a favourite I would have to point to Seppelt Show Port DP90, not because of its price a relative bargain at just under $40, but because its taste and texture are simply unforgettable. The show judges must think so to; it’s won more gold medals than every Australian Olympic team put together.

Young vintage ports are crammed full of fruit and tannin, liquorice, treacle and spice. Not surprisingly then, most young vintage ports less than six years old tend to be totally undrinkable. After a few years, however, the wine sorts itself out, the tannins mellow, and the booming discord becomes a harmony. They really need a decade or so, while some can be indescribably fine at thirty or more. Try one and see.

The best Australian vintage ports tend to come from houses of Reynella and Hardys, whose rich brambly flavours of plums and blackberries have mastered many a fine cheese. Others I don’t hesitate to recommend come from Campbells, Brown Brothers and Stanton and Killeen in Victoria’s north-east, D’Arenberg and Stevens Cambrai in the Southern Vales and Skillogalee in Clare.

-VINTAGE AND TAWNY PORTS -
WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE?

Tawny and vintage ports are so different to taste and drink it’s confusing they have the same name. Tawny ports are blends of several years that have been matured in barrels in the winery for several years – from three to forty or more. In that time it undergoes a slow and controlled oxidation which changes the colour to the typical tawny hue.

Tawnies are then bottled when they’re ready to drink. There ‘s no point in cellaring them further for all the maturation they needed was done in the winery. And what’s more, you’ll possibly have noticed that tawny ports have resealable corks, indicating that you don’t necessarily have to drink them all in one sitting, like a bottle of red wine, or vintage port, for example. They won’t spoil or oxidise much further. Try to finish the bottles within three months of opening, however, otherwise they could lose their freshness and flavour.

Vintage port is another issue, for they’re all made from the fruit of just one year. Bottled after only one or two years in wood, they usually want many years of further maturation in the bottle before being ready to drink. Most need to be at least ten years old before they have really hit their straps, and some can still be ‘pups’ at twenty. So they age like big red wines, and even need to be drunk like reds – preferably all in the one night, as they can go off. Many people aren’t aware of this – and it is one of life’s major tragedies to see a supposedly ‘special’ port once opened decades ago taste no better than the vinegar it has become.

With this in mind, be especially careful when ordering a glass of vintage port from an opened bottle in a restaurant. Just check to see that the wine is fresh and hasn’t been open since you first tried the restaurant eighteen months before. Please login to post comment