63 dow opinions and decanting

[Mark Hudson]

I have an event late this month where each person is to bring a bottle of wine. The wife and I are going, and I really want the excuse to break open a bottle of 63 port. I have a few in my cellar including a dow, but see most of the others on my favorite website, so I am asking, if you could only take one, which producer would you choose for the 63 vintage, and then how long would you decant it prior to the party?

[Moses Botbol]

'63 Dow is great, but '63 Fonseca comes to mind as the best of the vintage. 2 hours decant time to start.

Any '63 VP is a treat.

[Rob C.]

With the '63s, it would be hard to argue against any of Graham, Fonseca, Dow or Taylor.

As to which one is best? These wines have all been in bottle for so long that I think this depends as much on where/who bottled it and how it has been stored for the last 46 years as on the actual shipper. A number of us had a semi-blind tasting with the Dow, Graham, Fonseca and Taylor from each of the '63 '66 '70 and '77 vintages last night and Dow came up trumps in the '63 category. But another day, another bottle, and it could easily have been any one of the others.

If i were buying, i would be looking for well provenanced Graham or Fonseca. If i were choosing from my cellar, I'd simply go by the one whose condition/fill level/storage history i had most confidence in.

I haven't had other '63s on enough occassions to be able to suggest anything else, though my experience of Croft is that is now very mature. My only other comment would be that the '66s are in a really nice place at the moment...in my opinion, based on a few recent bottles and confirmed last night, even outshining the '63s and '70s for current drinking...

Decant? The Dow can still benefit from a 6hr decant, and i'm sure others would suggest more. The Dow '63 from last night was double decanted at 12.30, was poured into glasses at 6.30ish and continued to improve in glass over a period of 4 hours during the course of the evening.

[Jeff G.]

We had it after an hour of decant and it was marvelous.

[Mark Hudson]

I just received my bottle and have a question.

The label does not look anything like what cellar tracker shows for this producer and vintage.

it simply says

PORT
DOW VINTAGE 1963
PRODUCE OF PORTUGAL

Shipped and Bottled by
CHARLES KINLOCH & CO LTD
LONDON NW10

should I be concerned?

[Moses Botbol]

should I be concerned?

No. Labels are an afterthought for many shippers back then. Not all used the "known" type set for brand. Post some pictures! If the cork is not branded or have a vintage on it; that is another story.

[Mark Hudson]

[Eric Ifune]

Looks good to me. At that time, much was bottled and labeled outside Oporto. I've never had a bottling by Kinloch, but British bottling was of high quality back then. Some people think some were better than Oporto bottled examples.