On April 22 we visited The Big Fortified Tasting at Church House, Westminster, London. The venue was well planned and well organized. In addition to the general tasting we attended two Master Classes; Niepoort’s Bioma Vinha Velha and Madeira.

We had the opportunity to taste several new Vintage Port as well as some old colheita port, such as Kopke 1941. In addition to port there was an impressive selection of Vintage Madeira. D’Olivieira had the widest selection of Vintage Madeira with Boal 1987, Boal 1977, Verdelho 1981, Verdelho 1986, Terrantez 1977 and Sercial 1989. In addition Justinos and Blandy was also represented with some Vintage Madeira.

In addition to Port and Madeira there were Mosacatel de Setubal, Marsala and a vast selection of Sherry’s.

The Master class “Niepoort’s Bioma Vinha Velha” offered vertical tasting of the Pisca vineyard where Dirk Niepoort took us through all the vintages released so far. The first vintage was Pisca 2007. Due to name registration issues Niepoort had to change names to Bioma, which is the current name. The following wines were Bioma 2008, 2009, 2011 and 2013. In addition Dirk Niepoort let us try cask samples of the two batches of port that will be mixed to make the coming vintage 2015.

The Madeira Master class “A Wide Range of Unique Wines” with The Madeira Wine Institute and Rui Falcao gave a very good overview of Madeira and the new legislation.

Author: Jörgen