Tag Archives: Calem

Visit to Vila Nova de Gaia and Porto

In June this year we visited Porto and Douro, starting with a few days in Vila Nova de Gaia and Porto and concluding with visits to some of the quintas in Douro. In Vila Nova de Gaia we had several fantastic and very well organized tours and tastings, but also a few drop by tastings at some lodges we had not booked in advance.

Symington is one of the leading Port companies and has several lodges in Gaia. We visited Graham’s and Cockburn’s. At Graham’s, that is one of the bigger lodges in Gaia, the tours are very professional and interesting and the tasting was very good.

Tasting at Cockburn’s

Coopers at work in Cockburn’s lodge

Cockburn’s new lodge offers also a very good tour and tasting and includes a very interesting view into how the coopers make or renovate the pipes, barrels and vats.

Alvaro van Zeller in the Barao de Vilar lodge

Barao de Vilar Colheitas

At Barao de Vilar wine maker Alvaro van Zeller showed us their stock and bottling operation in Gaia. Barao de Vilar is much smaller as a company than the major port groups, but they are also one of the most creative. In order to make an impact they are making very clever packages and bottles, such as their 100 years tawny, consisting of four small bottles of 10+20+30+40 = 100 year tawny. Alvaro and his team also have a number of very old colheitas, of which we had the great honor to taste 1990, 1977, 1963 (Barao de Vilar vs Palmer), 1962, 1950, 1934 in addition to their vintage and white colheita. It was an absolutely amazing tasting which we will remember for a long time.

2016 Vintage Ports tasted at the Calem lodge

Sogevinus owns Cálem, Kopke, Burmester, Barros and some other brands. We visited the newly renovated and upgraded Cálem lodge that combines hi-tech presentation in combination with a traditional tour to provide a good experience. For example, they have a 5D-cinema experience. We had a very interesting tasting of their latest 2016 vintages as well as some fabulous older colheitas. We really appreciated to be able to taste their fine ports in the company of Sogevinus PR & communication manager Jose João Santos, Business manager Stefano Marello and winemaker Carlos Alves.

Beautiful colours of Dalva and Cruz port wines.

Cruz and Dalva are situated in the main square in Gaia, at Espaço Porto Cruz. Gran Cruz bought the company C. da Silva and their brand Dalva in 2007 and they are now both presented at Espaço Porto Cruz. At Grand Cruz you can have a meal in their restaurant or try a selection of their ports. We got a very good expose of Cruz and Dalva port including their fantastic white ports, Dalva Golden White, and Presidential Vintage 2011. Presidential is an alternative brand for Dalva used in some markets.

In addition, we stopped at some other lodges and had some ports in the bar at:

Ramos Pintos,
Quinta dos Corvos
Augusto´s
Portologia, port wine bar in Porto

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

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Another year has passed by and we have tasted a lot of fantastic Vintage Ports during this last year. We now have tasting notes for more than 1,500 different Vintage Ports.

We also reached the milestone of 150,000 visitors to our web site since we started it five years ago. Thank you all for visiting our site and thank you all for the kind words we here from you.

Among the all the tastings we had during this last year there are now some new added to our section of Great Tastings. We have had tasting on both Vintage 1988 and Vintage 1958, and we also have a report from the fantastic vertical on Calem, arranged by Axel Probst, that we participated in. So please enjoy reading about these tastings.

We hope that 2017 will bring many more fantastic tastings and events. See you all next year!

Great vacation wines

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Due to a Birthday within the family we went to Skagen, Denmark to celebrate. We started already at home, 3 days before with Reichsrat von Buhl’s Forster Ziegler Riesling Auslese 1945 as aperitif which was delicious indeed. After that Grand Cru Moenchberg Riesling from Guy Wach, Alsace to the first course, followed by Ch. Latour 1987, Ch. Haut Brion 1975 and Ch. La Misson Haut Brion to the main course. La Misson was outstanding indeed. A marvelous wine after 40 years to enjoy today and it will keep for some years more. To the dessert we followed up with F. Martin’s vintage 1977 and 1982.

When we arrived in Skagen we started the celebration with Bollinger Vielles Vignes Francaises, Blanc de Noir 2005 because we dared not to take too old wines with us in the car. It was a truly marvelous champagne and the first time we drank it. After that, before eating, we had another Champagne, 2004 Brut, Grand Cru from Petit-Lebrun just to make sure to feel that celebration week had started. To the first course we had Moutonne Grand Cru 2003 from Dom. Long-Depaquit, Chablis. The wine was elegant as always. After that Ch. La Misson Haut Brion 1997 and Clos de la Roche, Grand Cru 1998 from Vicent Girardin, Morey St. Denis and ended up with a dessert and Silval Vintage 1999 from Noval and Calem Vintage 1960.

Next day the evening started with a new lovely and elegant Champagne from Bollinger; their R.D. Extra Brut 1996. We continued with a Riesling 2012 Grand Cru Frankstein, Dom. Mersiol from Alsace and a white Ch. Latour Martillac 2011, Grand Cru Classe from Grave. To the meat we enjoyed Corton – Clos de la Vigne au Saint 2006 Grand Cru from Louis Latour, and Ch. Palmer 1985 and ended the evening with Ramos Pinto Vintage Port 1945 and a Madeira, Bual Solera Centenary 1845 from Cossart Gordon. Both wonderful wines.

The next day we started with Henriot champagne vintage 1996 (excellent) and continued with Riesling, Grand Cru Wineck-Schlossberg 2008 from Albert Schoech, Alsace and Les Fourneaux Prem. Cru 2011 from Louis Moreau, Chablis. The meat was enjoyed with Corton -Le Rognet Grand Cru 2006 from Maison Ambroise and Ch. Beychevelle 1975 both really mature and exciting. This evening we ended with Wiese-Krohn Vintage port from 1967 and 1965.

The 4^th of August we started the evening with a wonderful champagne from Michel Gonet, Vintage 1996 and the paté was enjoyed with a marvelous Ch. d’Yquem 1973. To the grilled salmon we had Riesling Grand Cru Altenberg de Wolxheim 2013 from Arthur Metz, Alsace and Gewurtztraminer Grand Cru Kirchberg de Barr 2004 from Dom. Hering, Alsace. The ports this evening were Messias’ Quinta do Cachao Vintage 1966 and 1976.

The next day we started with two champagnes. The first bottle was Cuvee Cleo Blanc de Blanc from Esterlin which was followed with the Vintage 1996 Cuvee Fleur de Champagne from Duval-Leroy. How lucky we were! The wine to the first meal was Riesling Grand Cru Rangen 2008 from Wolfberger, Alsace and the entrecôte was enjoyed with Ch. Leoville Barton 1980 and Ch. Leoville Poyferre’ 1962, both wonderful and mature. Now we had no more port left so to the dessert Ch. Doisy Daëne 2007 and Bernkasteler Doktoren, Riesling, Beerenauslese 1976 from Lauenburg was drinking well.

On the 6^th of August the champagne was vintage 2008 from Louis Roederer. The paté was enjoyed with Riesling Auslese Steinberger 1976, Staatsweingut and Ch. Suduiraut 1990. The meat was accompanied with Lacryma Christi del Vesuvio Reserva 1999 and “Les Crais” Prem. Cru 2009 from Camille Giroud, Gevry-Chambertin. Due to weight increase no dessert wines this evening.

The last day in Skagen the champagne was Huré Frères Blanc de Blanc from 1996. We continued with a Gewürztraminer Grand Cru Prelatenberg 2012, Alsace and Rauenthaler Baiken’s Riesling Auslese from 1976, Staatsweingut. The meat was enjoyed with Clos de Mouches 1986, Prem. Cru from Joseph Drouhin, Beaune and Cabernet Sauvignon Bella Oak vineyard 1982 from Heitz, Napa Valley. Both wines perfect mature and wonderful to drink. The day was lucky for us because we found a cheap Rozes Vintage Port in Skagen and the 2010 was a perfect ending of an unforgettable week.

Winter 2015

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We have had a wonderful winter with some excellent tastings.

In February the Wine Society 18% in Malmö had a Semi-Great tasting (i.e. below 20 houses) of the vintage 1984, which we have already written about here. You find all our larger tastings in the special section for Great Tastings.

In March we had a very interesting tasting of all seven vintages from Quinta do Vesuvio in-between 1989-1996 in the Danish Port Wine Club est. 1981 in Copenhagen. They were all very wonderful and many of them still needs some more age in the bottle.

On the 18^th of March i.e. after 3 years 2 months and 18 days we had our 100.000 visitor on our web-site. These visitors have been from more than 150 different countries! We are very surprised, but of course also happy, to see that Vintage Port seems to be popular all over the world!

Easter started on Thursday and we started with Mercier vintage 2004, elegant and tasty and Ch. Mouton Rotschild 1993 with the duck breast, which was quite good and attractive. Good Friday we started with Belle Époque vintage 1990. Then we had lobster with Alsace Grand Cru Engelberg Riesling vintage 2010 from Dom. Pfister and Ch. Bouscaut vintage 2008, Grand Cru Classe from Grave. The main course was horse filet which was accompanied with Ch. Lafite Rothschild 1985 and Ch. Margeaux 1985 and the dessert was accompanied with vintage port of course. They were 1955 Borges which was old, turbid and when decanted, it looked like a white port in the beginning but muddy and terrible at the end. The cork was from Borges but said 1980!? This was not good at all. The other vintage port was Calem 1955 produced by Quinta da Foz and Santo Antonio and it was delicious.

Easter Eve we started with de Venoge’s Grand Vin des Princes vintage 1993. With the pâté we had Scloss Johannisberg Riesling, auslese, Cabinet from 1893 (sic), still knit together but of course a bit dry which we maybe had expected and Ch. Filhot, Sautern from 1904 still wonderful sweet and very attractive. With the lamb we enjoyed Ch. Cheval Blanc 1985 and Ch. Latour 1985 and with the dessert we had 2 very mature and delicious vintage ports, Tuke Holdswoth 1935 and Ramos Pinto 1935. We had a nice night‘s sleep after that.