For The Love Of Port

Hi Andy(M), I very much admire your vintage list effort. I think there are many interesting questions here: - what are the criteria to give different bottlings of the wine with same origin separate entries (e.g., 1808 Malvasia Solera, 1920 MWC Boal)? - should the same wine bottled at the same time u...

Eric, was it this year's Barbeito Bastardo 20-year-old Lot 1 or the 2021 version of 67 bottles from the Mistura collection?

Andreas Platt wrote: ↑Thu Mar 16, 2023 11:36 am A stash of 1934 H&H Verdelho.

Andreas, were these bottled in France?

I will, likely, be able to join in most places in the US (with some preference for Midwest or East coast ) . Would be happy to contribute.

The IVBAM was established in 2006 and took over from IVM as a regulatory body. I guess shippers could still use IVM selos issued before that, but any new issues from that point should have been from IVBAM.

My personal rule of thumb for opening the 1970s-1990s vintages is:
a. Let the wines have at least 2 years in the bottle
b. Use the most recent bottling I can get my hands on without violating rule a.

Indeed, I have found it curious that, with the exception of several notable 19th century Terrantez vintages, most of the known pre-XX century Borges wines have dates that end in zero. The family wines mentioned by Andy & Eric, the recently surfaced family 1860 CTO Verdelho, the commercial 1790 T...

too much

A very interesting question - on several occasions I have heard from Ricardo stories about wines being damaged by spending too much time in cask. He emphasized the importance of finding the right moment to transfer to demijohns and he was talking about the wines much younger than the D'Oliveiras gre...

Nice article, but calling prince Henry the Navigator a sea captian?

A couple of years ago I asked one of the participants of that event about the 1802. Here is the explanation I got: 1802 D’Oliveira was bought by Alex Liddell c 1992 directly from Luis d’Oliveira. It has a JNV seal (like the 1795) but the IVBAM say they don’t have the records to verify what the numbe...

An excellent point, Eric. Here is an auction blurb on this wine from the sale of Patrick Grubb's collection in 2016 ( https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/23373/lot/654/?category=list ): Barros e Sousa Malvasia Fajã 1914 Tasting note: 'Amazing to reflect on the history behind this wine. The colour is de...

I distinctly remember Chris Blandy explaining in one of his seminars that approvals are solely based on the tasting panel assessment.

This is very curious - here are the pictures of a bottle I own. I thought it is the A|B seal of ABSL. Perhaps it is something else - can anybody recognize it?
I also have a bottle with no seal (acquired from the same source)

Thank you, Alan, for reviving this thread! I can add that I have bought a bottle of "Palther" from Mannie several years ago along with several other Borges family wines bottled in 1989. All were recently re-waxed without the usual "B" seals on top. Mannie told me he acquired all ...

Here are the ones I am aware of: MWC: 1954 (under Leacock, Blandy's & MWC labels), 1960 (Blandy's), 1969 (Miles, Blandy's), 1974 (Cossart Gordon), 1975 (Blandy's, Cossart Gordon), 1976 (Blandy's), 1977 (Blandy's, Cossart Gordon), 1980 (Blandy's) D'Oliveiras: 1971, 1977, 1978, 1988 (bottled both ...

1900 Manuel de Sousa Herdeiros Boal

1902 Barbeito Madeira Verdelho Pico dos Barcelos
1929 Barbeito Verdelho (seems to have been bottled ~20 ago)
1979 HM Borges Sercial
1988 Barbeito Sercial Manuel Euginio Fernandes

Who bottled the 1914 Faja dos Padres? ABSL? I believe so. No producer was identified in the stencils (and the stencils were in horrible shape). However: - The bottle comes from the Patrick Grubb batch sold at Bonhams in 2016 and is identified as "Barros e Sousa Malvasia Faja" on the aucti...

1864 Boal TTC Lomelino (the bottle was opened in 2019 and there are still a few drops remaining)
1863 Barbeito Boal
1914 Faja dos Padres Malvasia (also opened in 2019, continued to improve for many months)