TN: Cockburn's Quintas dos Canais, 1998, 20 pabv; shipped and bottled by Cockburn Smithes & Co., S.A., imported by Allied Domecq Wines, Healdburg, CA; $30/750 ml (sale price), Arrow Wines, Kettering, OH.
Dense and dusty purple. Throws off a bit of bottle stink at first, but then is full of marzipan, violets, stewed plum, walnut oil, and violets, followed by an interesting melange of hard spices--nutmeg, anise, vanilla, and clove. For a young wine, it's minimally spiritous.
The wine is reservedly sweet on palate, with a mild dose of ripe and fine-grained tannins: fruity and somewhat soft
At this stage, powerful, complex, forward, and promising; perhaps an early-maturing port or perhaps not, based on its current muscular but forward drinkability. Reminds me of a well-built good young Grahams with an extra layer of exotics. An excellent value at this price. If there is any criticism, it's that this wine is a little light on what Hugh Johnson calls SAP (séve): guts, acidity, unresolved bitter fruitiness, and young tannins.
On the second day after opening, this wine really shows that it will be an early maturing one. It's very delicious now, but it simply doesn't have the structure for very long aging.
According to back-label information, this was made from early-maturing fruit picked before a later-harvest downpour from favored spots on the Canais, or, as the Portuguese have it, the 'canal'. This is one of the two base Quintas that Cockburn currently relies on, they having purchased it fairly recently. Apparently it has the highest potential for quality of any of the Cockburn properties, from what I've read.
1998 Cockburn's Quinta dos Canais Vintage Port
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*John Trombley
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1998 Cockburn's Quinta dos Canais Vintage Port
Last edited by *John Trombley on Mon Jun 12, 2006 7:12 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Best, John Trombley Piqua (Miami County, on the Miami-Erie Canais, OH)
