For The Love Of Port

Purchased while in search of an "average" Port. The other bottle, a Tuke Holdsworth Porto Wine Reserve, fared a bit better.

The cork was spongy and disintegrated when I tried to extract it, so I had to push the remaining crumbs into the bottle and then decant using my usual funnel and mesh. An aroma of butterscotch came into the room as I decanted, which seemed strange for a 30-yr old VP. I suspect that this bottle has been stored upright for many years if not decades and that the cork dried out and the Port is completely oxidized.

1983 Tuke Holdsworth VP

Color: Light tawny with a pink tone to it. It looks like an extremely old and thin VP. There's a greenish-yellow tint near the rim.

Nose: Butterscotch, fruity caramel, sweet marzipan, and a non-offensive rubber-like tone. It smells rich, but it doesn't smell like Port. Sherry, perhaps?

Palate: A bit hot, rather thin, and mostly just sweet. There's a flavor there somewhere between butterscotch and marzipan, but it's hard to identify. The rubber is in there, too. It pretty much tastes like it smells, only not as rich.

Finish: Warm but not hot, echoes the palate and then tails off with a fairly harsh bite which leaves a lingering bitterness in the mouth. Oddly, the finish (especially the tail) is quite long. The tail runs through apple skin, grape stem, celery, and other things before finally fading out after a couple of minutes.

Score: Not Rated. I'm pretty confident that this is damaged, likely due to a dried-out cork. The color is off, the nose is off, and the palate is off. It isn't offensive, but I wouldn't choose to drink it if there were anything else available. Like, say, a Tuke Holdsworth Porto Wine Reserve.

Your notes aren't too far off mine. I found a distracting note of bandaid in the nose and palate--maybe that's your rubber? And brown sugar was the charitable descriptor of the flavor profile, though that may have been affected by the color, too. It looks like a bad version of a tawny. The interesting thing is that the label and bottles look pretty pristine. In fact, I found myself doubting that they could possibly have been bottled in 1985, the bottles looked too 'good.' It probably was never a particularly good port, but age has not been kind to it. I will admit we didn't finish drinking our 1983--we chilled it and poured it over lime sorbet!

You were kinder to the reserve ruby than I was. For me, its highest and best use was to poach pears. It's only about a dollar less than I can get Warre's Warrior at the local QFC, so it didn't even float my QPR boat.

Now that 1980 TH vintage, that one went straight back to Grocery Outlet for a refund. Dunno what I was thinking, getting a 1980 (weak year even for the big boys) from a lodge like Tuke and Holdsworth! No notes beyond "should not have put this in mouth." Still available at the Crown Hill Seattle GO for the bold and brave...

My bottles are pristine as well, but I'm certain the TH83 is damaged and not just weak. That's why I didn't rate it - there's no way that's representative of what the Port is really like.

I doubt it was ever fabulous, but I see no reason that it couldn't have been 85-89 if properly cared for.

Poached pears would be good with the Reserve. But I don't mind drinking it, either. I just wouldn't choose to if something better (which would be very easy to find around here) were available.

I found this at the Bonney Lake Wash. Grocery Outlet for about $15. Most interesting to have comments from more experienced tasters for this 1983 port. I have trouble indentifying all those specific flavor hues. My bottle was reddish brown at first, and seemed to be quite brown after a day or two, but I'm not sure that's possible. I'd say the term one dimensional might apply--this port is like a nice piece of toast. I thought it's a bit like some Australian ports, maybe without the buttery(?) quality--but the comparison to sherry is most apt. It seemed to me to have a gritty earthy aftertaste in the back of my throat after a few seconds---which keeps it from being cloying. It seemed to me 30 years was too long to wait for this, and I enjoyed it but it's no great bargain. Apparently the G Outlet acquired quite a lot of it. My cork seemed in good condition.