Ports

From Park Lane to the park bench, port is the only nightcap for millions who think about what they drink, even if that thought is only in their subconscious mind. Figures just released show that Australians put away a remarkable amount of port over the summer, so heaven knows what we might be capable of this winter.

Port is one of the traditional styles of Australian wine, although as its name suggests, 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 Portuguese port.

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, although it did create completely different styles 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 it does to us.

There is a certain aura surrounding port that continues to mystify even those who sell it. Brian Miller is the Fine Wines Manager for Seppelt, who as a company promote port as much as any other in Australia. Seppelt’s top port is perhaps Australia’s top port, and is the legendary Para Liqueur 100 Year-Old Port, not to be confused with the very creditable straight Para Liqueur Port, which is sold at an average age of around fifteen years.

Miller has released a fact sheet detailing the various Seppelt Para Liqueur Ports, which proves fascinating reading. In 1988 Seppelt released a port dated 1888, which fetches the extraordinary sum of $2,000 per bottle. That sounds expensive until you read that the 1878 port, released only ten years earlier, is now worth an estimated $3,500 per bottle, an appreciation of 175 above inflation!!! Although the figures are described as guides only, the point is well made.

But not all ‘collector’s port’ appreciate in this fashion. Remember the days of the Yalumba Racehorse Series? Highly decorative, and admittedly very fine Vintage Ports were sold under the labels carrying names and pictures of the racehorses of the day, around six years ago. With the ‘limited runs’ of the labels, which in reality are no more than paper and ink, certain ports, especially the ‘Dulcify’ port if my memory serves me, started claiming absurd prices, rising to hundreds of dollars per bottle.

The port was young and undrinkable at the time, but hundreds of people were caught in the craze, believing that a few dollars now could be worth a small fortune in time ahead. The unfortunate few who were unable to sell their wine before common sense intervened and the prices returned to a normal level have nothing left apart from a damn fine port which should be doing pretty well in another five years’ time. The same wine, under the conventional Yalumba label, would have cost a mere fraction of the price.

So what is the ideal port? Let’s begin with the tawnies. Tawny ports are by far the most common ports in Australia, and they are what you will usually be given 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; the oldest, and best really look the part.

Those with the oldest average age justifiably command the highest prices. Although some of the premium styles finish quite dry, most are left with some residual sweetness. Many of these premium styles are fortified with the addition of brandy rather than with neutrally-flavoured fortifying spirit. This addition is usually made half-way through the fermentation, leaving about half of the natural grape sugar in the wine.

The traditional Australian tawny is a sweet, rich and viscous, full of flavour, which at its best has an effect on the senses not unlike liquid velvet. Many of the heavier, denser styles are described as ‘liqueur’ port, although they are not strictly liqueurs at all. Top tawny ports are made with high-quality brandy spirit in the fortification process, which contributes to their warmth and spirit-like sensations.

I recommend two tawnies from Yalumba – the well-known Galway Pipe and its new cousin the Ten Year-Old Port, the Mildara Cavendish Port and the All Saints Premium Tawny Port Blend. The Yalumba wines are rich, round and intense in flavour, the Mildara balanced, matured and fruity and the All Saints is complex, earthy and wonderfully old and developed.

Another North-East Victorian firm, Baileys of Glenrowan, has re-launched its range of fortified wine, amongst which is the brilliant Glenrowan Tawny Port, which is aged and spirity with delightfully penetrative mellow, figgy fruit.

Slightly drier, more elegant ports made in the drier, lighter, more spirity Portuguese mould include the Lindemans Bin RF 1 Tawny Port, McWilliams Hanwood Port strictly a little too fruity for this bracket and Penfolds Grandfather Port, patriarch of the
style.

Young vintage ports seem jammed full of fruit, treacle and spice. Many even have licorice-like flavours, and most are loaded with tannin in their infancy. Not surprisingly then, most young vintage ports less than four, years old are usually totally undrinkable. After a few years, however, the wine sorts itself out, the tannin mellows, and the booming discord becomes a harmony. Try one and see. The best Australian vintage ports tend to come from Houses of Reynella and Hardys, whose rich flavours of plums and blackberries have mastered many a cheese. Pirramimma of the same region, Stanton and Killeen of Rutherglen and Mount Avoca the Pyrenees, Victoria vintage ports are also worth snaffling on sight.


-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