The Roskilde Port Wine Fair 2019

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Started in 2015, the Roskilde Port Wine Fair has already established itself as a yearly highlight for all Danish (and Swedish) port lovers. The Fair offers a wide range of port wines in all categories, from both large, well known producers, as well as small family owned Quintas. There is always something new to discover.

As usual we focused on the Vintage Ports and there were plenty! We tried about 60 different Vintage Ports, all with tasting notes know available here on the web site.

The latest released Vintage, the magnificent 2016, was well represented. The Vintage is still too young to fully appreciate but the power and balance in these wines are very good and there is good reason for all the positive remarks the Vintage has received after the release. Vintage 2015 must not be forgotten, it is also a very good Vintage and some producers actually made better Vintage Port in 2015 than 2016. The interesting thing is that 2017 is already spoken of as a very good Vintage and we got to taste a promising cask sample from Quinta do Pego. We look forward to see the declarations of Vintage 2017 coming over the next couple of months.

We would like to thank all the importers, representatives from Portugal and the arrangers of the Fair for a wonderful afternoon.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

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When looking back on 2018 we must say that it has been a fantastic year in terms of all lovely port wines we got to taste and all devoted and passionate port producers, importers and port lovers we got to meet.

We are happy to see that there seems to be more port related events than ever and some of the finest we have participated in during this last year is

  • The Port Wine Fair in Roskilde, Denmark
  • The Big Fortified Tasting in London, UK
  • The Port Wine Festival in Copenhagen, Denmark
  • The Port Wine Messe in Leverkusen, Germany

During summer we also made a very nice trip to Porto, Vila Nova de Gaia and the Douro valley with our families and got the chance to visit many producers, both well-known but also some smaller producers that are relatively new in the business. All in all a fantastic trip and we hope we can go back soon again.

We wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year in 2019.

Sten, Jörgen and Stefan

Silver Jubilee tasting in The Wine Society 18%

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To celebrate the Silver Jubilee, marking the 25th anniversary of The Wine Society 18% in Malmö, Sweden, we decided to have a special tasting. Unfortunately 1993, when the Society was founded, was a horrible year for Vintage Port and only one producer declared, Quinta da Romaneira’s single quinta Quinta das Liceiras. So to get a proper tasting we decided to add all the 1992 Vintage Ports as well. So, it ended up with a proper Jubilee tasting of 24 Vintage Ports in total.

On November 8 we conducted the tasting with 16 attending participants. The tasting was held in two flights and it was semi-blind.

You can read all about the tasting here.

Port Wine Festival at Børsen in Copenhagen

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It was with great expectations we went to this year’s Festival in Copenhagen. Not only because we were looking forward to taste some 2016 Vintage Ports, the latest generally declared Vintage, but also to learn more about the Colheitas from Andresen in a special tasting with the owner of Andresen, Carlos Flores dos Santos and their wine maker Alvaro van Zeller.

Andresen are producing both Colheita and Vintage Ports, but according to Carlos they have always considered themselves of being a Tawny and Colheita house. After participating in this tasting we can understand why. Vintage Port lovers as we are, we have of course tasted many of their Vintage Ports, and even if they are good they are not competing with the best in that category. Their Colheitas on the other hand are indeed very good and in this tasting we got the chance to taste two Colheitas from each decade all the way back to the 1960’s, and on top of that two older fantastic Colheitas. 1937 Colheita bottled already in 1980, meaning it had about the same time in wood as on bottle. This was a great wine, showing elegancy, complexity and a quite light body, but with a long lovely finish. The last wine was more recently bottled Colheita 1910; actually it was bottled when 100 years old in 2010. This wine has an enormous concentration and a fat lovely aftertaste which never seems to end. Indeed a top quality Colheita!

Carlos Flores dos Santos and Alvaro van Zeller

In the open tasting we focused on the Vintage Ports and we found some interesting new producers we never got the chance to taste before. Dona Otilia, Martha’s, Boeira and Lacrau were new to us and we also tasted Quinta da Oliveirinha from Alves de Sousa for the first time. The latest Vintage 2016 was quite well represented and some of them are very impressive, we especially liked Sandeman and Dow’s but there were others that also impressed on us like Churchill, Kopke, Barros and Quinta da Romaneira. Even if 2016 is generally declared and 2015 is not there are for sure some really good wines made from 2015 as well. One that we have been very impressed by since we tasted it the first time last year is Niepoort Vintage Port 2015, and once again it shows that the best from 2015 can match many of the 2016 Vintage Ports.

Overall this year’s Festival shows that port wine is more popular than ever in Denmark. There is a huge assortment of all kinds of port available from many devoted and passionate importers, many of them with great knowledge of Port in general and there is always something new to learn when talking to them over a glass of port. So a big thanks to all of you for all the generosity, both with wine and knowledge. We are also of course sending our compliments to Mr. Henrik Oldenburg for the great arrangements. This is indeed one of the highlights on the year for port lovers like us.

Two Great Tasting with George Sandeman

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We have been lucky enough to participate in two Great Sandeman tastings together with George Sandeman in the last six months. The first one was in London in May at the Big Fortified Tasting where George Sandeman held a Masterclass tasting together with wine maker Luís Sottomayor. The following vintages from Sandeman were tasted:

Vintage 1963, 1968 (quite rare), 1977, 2000, 2003, 2007, 2011, 2016

George Sandeman and Luís Sottomayor

The second Sandeman Tasting was in September in Copenhagen organized by the excellent owners of www.vintageportvin.dk and the following wines were included

Vintage 1963, 1967, 1970, 1975, 1977, 1980, 2000, 2016, Vau 1999, Quinta do Seixo 2015,

10, 20 and 40 years Tawny, LBV 2011, Founders Reserve and Imperial Reserve Tawny.

Two brilliant and exclusive tastings guided by George. It was very interesting to hear his analysis of the development of Sandman’s Vintage Ports over the decades. These tastings showed that Sandeman is again making top quality Vintage Ports. It will be interesting to follow the latest Vintages from 2007, 2011 and 2016 and see if they develop into the same kind of fantastic wines as for instance the 1963 and 1970.

We are very thankful for the opportunities to taking part in these two wonderful tastings. Tasting notes are on our Sandeman page.

Philipson Prestige tasting in Copenhagen

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At the prestige tasting on Sep 21 Philipson Wine had invited several of their suppliers to let us taste a selection of their wines. Some of the wines that we appreciated the most were: Sassicaia 2015, Bollinger Le Grand année 2007, Ch Cantemerle 2015, Ch Kirwan 2015, Ch Talbot 2015, Nyetimber Blanc de Blanc 2010 and Burmester Colheita 1955. Burmester was represented by Stefano Marello, who we also had the pleasure of meeting at our tour to Porto and Vila Nova de Gaia last June.

Theis Bordeaux Tasting

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This year Theis annual Bordeaux tasting was bigger and better than ever. With 27 Medoc Grand Cru Classe and a total of about 100 of classified Bordeaux vintages (including St Emilion and Graves/Sauternes) it was impossible to try all the good wines served. As we focused on Bordeaux we did miss out on some of the other wines served.

Most Chateaux had 2017 and an older vintage to sample. 2017 is a fairly good year, but not a classic. For most of the Chateaux their older bottle was the better.
We were particularly impressed by Ch Pichon-Longueville-Comtesse de Lalande and Cos d’Estournel, both regarding their 2017 and their older vintage, 2010 and 2014 respectively. On the sweet side, there were some lovely Sauternes that really were superb, especially after sampling almost 80 young red tannic Bordeaux. Ch Suduiraut, Guiraud and Coutet were all fabulous. We are impressed by the outstanding collection of good wines that Theis had managed to set up at this wonderful tasting.

Port Wine Day – September 10th

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Sten, one of the authors on vintageport.se have been celebrating September 10th with port wine every year since 1976, the year he fell in love with the wonderful enjoyment port wine brings.
His celebration on this day is due to his birthday, this year celebrated for 75 years. We all hope you will have a nice glass of Vintage Port that day.

Celebration of the Port Wine Day is also celebrated on September 10th on the day when its designation of origin was created, in 1756.