I had an opportunity to visit Oporto and VNG late last year and was given a tiny slip of paper by one of the staff members at Kopke. The paper has the following three titles:
Um Seculo De Colheitas De Vinho Do Porto
Un Siecle De Millesimes De Porto
Value of Last Century of Port Wines
I was under the impression that it was created by Kopke, but it may be an IVDP-generated scoring.
In any event, the sheet contains a list of years from 1892 to 1992 and 'scores' for each Colheita vintage (2-7).
Is this something that is updated often (e.g., on the web) and publicly available? I'd really like to get my hands on something like this for each port house that I stumble across on store shelves. It would certainly help with purchasing decisions... :)
Anyone else seen this sheet before? What do we know about this?
I've never heard of it myself, but then again, I just started drinking port and have never been to Portugal. I look forward to seeing if anyone else out there knows anything about this.
I've never heard of anything like this being released by an "official" body, such as the IVDP.
There are a number of sources for unofficial scores for vintages across the web but I've never seen anything similar for colheita years. I suspect that it is something that Kopke have put together as part of their marketing support for their range of colheitas - which are very good!
Al B. wrote:There are a number of sources for unofficial scores for vintages across the web but I've never seen anything similar for colheita years. I suspect that it is something that Kopke have put together as part of their marketing support for their range of colheitas - which are very good!
Actually, if you saw the size/condition/print of the paper, you wouldn't consider it a marketing tool... I honestly think that I walked away with an insider's guide to the Colheitas (e.g., a tool for the tasting room staff, not necessarily intended for external consumption). But who knows...
Would you mind posting some of links (or point me to forum posts that do) for the sites you referenced that track vintage years? I haven't seen any comprehensive lists ... official or unofficial ... except that little piece of paper that I have. It would be interesting to see if they are in-sync.
I'm sure that Roy has posted a guide to the quality and overall scores of vintage years and I'm sure that I remember a link to the article being available somewhere on the site ... but I'm damned if I can find it now! Sorry, perhaps someone else can help.
However, here's a link to a chart that Berry Brothers have on their website. Its not great, but it's a start. They also have a nice historical wine chart that gives a score for port vintages all the way back to 1846.
I honestly think that I walked away with an insider's guide to the Colheitas (e.g., a tool for the tasting room staff, not necessarily intended for external consumption). But who knows...