For The Love Of Port

I've posted elsewhere that I am thoroughly enjoying drinking my way through a fairly large stock of Croft 2004 LBV - really enjoyable port at a great QPR when you consider it was bought for $4-5 per half. This has evolved from being a bit aggressive and harsh to being something sweet, fruity and balanced.

I'll use this wine to illustrate a means of producing LBV that I had not been aware of until recently.

There are a number of LBV ports which are filtered before being bottled. This process produces a wine which is sediment free, very stable in the bottle and does not need decanting. It will change if left in the bottle for any period of time, but will not probably not improve only lose fruit and depth. Most likely, it will take very many years before any sediment drops out of the wine. Perhaps perfect port for a restaurant or bar or somewhere not able to decant.

There are also a small number of producers who make and sell "Traditional" LBV. This is port which is fined and racked before bottling and which is often allowed to lie in the bottle for a few years before being released. These ports are made to improve in the bottle, gain in complexity and making better drinking after 5-20 years than if drunk soon after bottling. These will throw a sediment and will need to be decanted if left in the bottle for any length of time.

The process that I hadn't been aware of but which has produced very good results with the Croft 2004 LBV sits somewhere between the two. Before bottling the port is chilled - perhaps to around -4C - and then fined and racked. This has the effect of increasing the amount of insolubles that are taken out of the port by the fining but is nowhere near as aggressive as filtration. While I've not noticed any sediment in my Croft 2004 LBV, I have experienced an evolution and perhaps a 1-2 point improvement in my scores since first trying it in early 2010. On the label, this is described as "unfiltered late bottled vintage".

It shouldn't have come as a surprise to me that gentle cold stabilisation was being used in the production of LBV since this is a techinique that has been used widely and effectively in the rest of the wine industry, but this was the first time I had become aware of it being used with port - and I'm pleased to be able to give a positive report on its effectiveness.

It is also a process used in the beer world, and is sometimes referred to as cold crashing. It goes much colder than lagering.

Al B. wrote:There are also a small number of producers who make and sell "Traditional" LBV. This is port which is fined and racked before bottling and which is often allowed to lie in the bottle for a few years before being released.

The description "Traditional" is no longer used and has now been replaced by "Bottle Matured". But are you sure that this style of port is fined before bottling?

Derek T. wrote:

Al B. wrote:There are also a small number of producers who make and sell "Traditional" LBV. This is port which is fined and racked before bottling and which is often allowed to lie in the bottle for a few years before being released.

The description "Traditional" is no longer used and has now been replaced by "Bottle Matured". But are you sure that this style of port is fined before bottling?

True - bottle matured is now used instead of Traditional and is probably a better description.

I'm sure someone once told me that the bottle matured ports are treated the same way as vintage ports before bottling, and that these are gently fined and racked before the clear juice is bottled but I fully accept that I might have dreamt this as I can't find it in my notes anywhere.

I have always understood it to be the opposite, that VP (and Traditional LBV and Crusted) was not fined before bottling. Indeed I recall reading somewhere that some shippers used to advocate rolling the pipes immediately before bottling to ensure that every bottle had a good dose of crust in it from day one.

Quite recently, a producer was telling me that the initial sediment formed is injurious to the wine, and needs to be separated from it, while another served to confirm my suspicion that the presence of sediment in a bottle of VP is beneficial to its maturation and keeping qualities.

..so I wonder what the cut off point is?

- Was the habit of barrel rolling actually a good idea?

I had not heard of the barrel rolling that Derek mentions, but otherwise am in full agreement about how the processing works with Tradiçional LBV, (or Traditional, both versions used to appear on labels in years past, depending on the origin of the producer).

Great topic, thanks Alex.

Tom Archer wrote:Quite recently, a producer was telling me that the initial sediment formed is injurious to the wine, and needs to be separated from it, while another served to confirm my suspicion that the presence of sediment in a bottle of VP is beneficial to its maturation and keeping qualities.

..so I wonder what the cut off point is?

Tom
I believe you're referring to the "racking" of a wine off its lees. Periodic racking is important or the wine can take on off or dusty notes and cause other non-beneficial issues in the long term. This is true for many types wines and not unique to Port. How often it is done would depend on a number of factors, including the age and type of wine or Port. But typically when very young, anywhere from once to a few times a year. When this happens the barrel is gently cleaned and the wine/Port put back, or transferred to another barrel altogether. But you also don't want to rack too often as this can cause other issues, such as excessive or premature oxidation. So both answers you've heard would technically be correct.

Tom Archer wrote:
- Was the habit of barrel rolling actually a good idea?

I have no idea, but the vision I get of this is quite amusing. I could only imagine a bunch of guys in a dingy cellar trying to roll a bunch of heavy barrels around in a cramped negotiants cellar before bottling it.

Back to doing my best to divert the topic to beer. Some beers in barrel (e.g. Belgian) are rolled around to rouse the yeast and get a more complete fermentation. We did this for my Friek.

Having done a bit more research, it seems that vintage port (and therefore I assume Bottle Aged or Traditional LBV) is not fined before bottling, just racked.

Al B. wrote:

Derek T. wrote:

Al B. wrote:There are also a small number of producers who make and sell "Traditional" LBV. This is port which is fined and racked before bottling and which is often allowed to lie in the bottle for a few years before being released.

The description "Traditional" is no longer used and has now been replaced by "Bottle Matured". But are you sure that this style of port is fined before bottling?

True - bottle matured is now used instead of Traditional and is probably a better description.

I actually don't come across much "Bottle Matured" LBV - Warre is just about the only producer i can think of that is widely available around me - perhaps the Cruz 2002 on sale at Sainsbury recently too.

Most of what i see (Noval, Niepoort, Quevedo etc.) is just plain "unfiltered" lbv that has not spent the requisite time in bottle (4 yrs before release?) to carry the label "Bottle Matured" - even the recent release of Smith Woodhouse LBV does not (as far as i can tell) qualify for the "bottle matured" designation (there seemed to be a jump from the 1999 "bottle matured" to the 2005).

It is a pity, because much "unfiltered" LBV is positioned as "ready to drink", when in fact i personally find it far from ready (and you see with the Croft 2004 halves, for instance, a big difference with some extra cellar time).

For quite a while now Smith Woodhouse has produced LBV's that have four years of additional bottle aging after sitting in wood for four.

Roy Hersh wrote:For quite a while now Smith Woodhouse has produced LBV's that have four years of additional bottle aging after sitting in wood for four.

But there seems to have been a jump from 1999 (which was bottle matured) to 2005 in the UK market-place. The old 94-95-99 releases are now pretty hard to get hold of.

Derek T. wrote:

Al B. wrote:There are also a small number of producers who make and sell "Traditional" LBV. This is port which is fined and racked before bottling and which is often allowed to lie in the bottle for a few years before being released.

The description "Traditional" is no longer used and has now been replaced by "Bottle Matured". But are you sure that this style of port is fined before bottling?

Alex - as Derek suggests, i also think that the Warre "Bottle Matured" LBVs are completely unfined - or at least i hope so!!

See the "ageing/bottling" section of the official spec sheet for the 2001 Warre LBV - i came across this when advising a very strict vegan about which ports would be suitable for her (apparently the fining process almost always uses egg/animal/fish product, which made any port that has been through that process unsuitable). So i would be slightly embarrassed if this were not the case!

Interestingly, i'm sure Oscar said that his unflitered LBV goes through a very light fining process. So i do don't think it's a hard and fast rule that "unfiltered LBV" = "unfined".

The 1999 SW LBV is easy to find around here in the "right places" for $17. Every time I see them, I buy more.

Roy Hersh wrote:The 1999 SW LBV is easy to find around here in the "right places" for $17. Every time I see them, I buy more.

Where is that? I've never seen it for that cheap. It's normally around the $25-30 range.

Rob C. wrote:i came across this when advising a very strict vegan about which ports would be suitable for her (apparently the fining process almost always uses egg/animal/fish product, which made any port that has been through that process unsuitable). So i would be slightly embarrassed if this were not the case.

There are plenty of fining agents out there that are inorganic, such as bentonite and Polyclar, so you shouldn't rule out any wine that is fined as being non-vegan.

Eric Menchen wrote:

Rob C. wrote:i came across this when advising a very strict vegan about which ports would be suitable for her (apparently the fining process almost always uses egg/animal/fish product, which made any port that has been through that process unsuitable). So i would be slightly embarrassed if this were not the case.

There are plenty of fining agents out there that are inorganic, such as bentonite and Polyclar, so you shouldn't rule out any wine that is fined as being non-vegan.

Unless there's a way to tell definitively from the label or website literature, i think she'd have to. Certainly that's the approach with beer. When i looked into it, i recall finding a website which quoted someone from Symington Family Estates saying that they used egg in their fining.

Most <b>craft</b> beer in the US is neither fined nor filtered post fermentation. Irish moss (actually seaweed) is commonly used in the boil to coagulate proteins, but that passes the vegan test. Of the craft beers that are filtered, most use DE, some Perlite. I can't remember a craft beer fined post-boil, but faintly recall someone might have used Polyclar. That isn't to say there aren't some craft beers here that aren't vegan-compliant, but ask a small producer and they'll probably be happy to tell you what they do.