Question about aging Colheita

[Andreas Nielsen]

I recently bought a Krohn Colheita 1982 (bottled in 2017) and was wondering how long it will keep in the bottle. It is my birth year and I would love to share the bottle with my son one day.

Will it keep e.g. for 15 years? And if so, how would it most likely have changed compared to drinking it within the first couple of years after bottling?

Thanks

Andreas

[Andy Velebil]

Yes it will keep for 15 years.

How you will like it in 15 years is the question.

Krohn's does not bottle their tawny's to stand up to lots of bottle age. They tend to lose that perceived "crispness" and get very soft and "flat" tasting. By flat I mean they show much more sweet and simple when the acidity goes into the background over time in bottle. Some people don't mind that, some people don't like that. I am generally not a fan of it. What I like in Tawny's is that bright acidity that gives them a fresh crisp taste.

If you like that crisp acidity I'd suggest finding something from Niepoort, who's tawny's tend to hold up much better with bottle age than most others.

[Moses Botbol]

Totally agree with Andy, but what's the harm in storing a couple of bottles? It will be more for the novelty with your son than for a profound drinking experience. I'd shy off on storing a case, but sure for 2-3 bottles.

I am in the side of preferring fresh bottled Colheita. I like the fresh and vibrant flavors right out the bottle.

[Glenn E.]

I wouldn't use words like "flat" and "simple" to describe what happens because neither is completely accurate. The perceived acidity usually mellows over time, becoming more of a supporting structure rather than a primary note. The acidity is still there - chemically nothing has changed - but the way it is perceived changes over time. I find tawnies that have been aged in bottle to be smoother and creamier, or as Andy put it less bright and less crisp.

Until you've tried it, though, you won't really know whether or not you enjoy the changes that take place. So as Moses said, what's the harm in experimenting with a few bottles? A Niepoort or a Kopke would likely be a better choice than a Krohn, but I have numerous Krohns with 10+ years in bottle that actually got better at around 8-10 years in bottle.

In any case, it won't go bad. Port is extremely sturdy and will last decades in any form. At minimum you'll have a pleasant drink to share with your son and reminisce about the good ol' days.

[Andy Velebil]

I wouldn't use words like "flat" and "simple" to describe what happens because neither is completely accurate. .

We will have to agree to disagree

[Andreas Nielsen]

Thanks for the feedback Andy, Moses and Glenn.

Think I’ll open the bottle soon and see if I like the style etc. If so I can follow your advise, Moses, and put down a few extra.

Again thanks you all for the thorough and informative feedback

[Eric Menchen]

The acidity is still there - chemically nothing has changed - but the way it is perceived changes over time.

While I'm not a chemist, I don't think we can claim that nothing chemically has changed with respect to the acid over time. Some acids can react with glass, but probably not those in wine. Acids can react with air and oxygen, and with a corked bottle and enough time, there probably will be some of this. My quick googling suggests that some acids will mellow (higher pH), and some acidic solutions can actually become stronger. Now we need a chemist to tell us what can happen to those particular acids in wine.

[Glenn E.]

The acidity is still there - chemically nothing has changed - but the way it is perceived changes over time.

While I'm not a chemist, I don't think we can claim that nothing chemically has changed with respect to the acid over time. Some acids can react with glass, but probably not those in wine. Acids can react with air and oxygen, and with a corked bottle and enough time, there probably will be some of this. My quick googling suggests that some acids will mellow (higher pH), and some acidic solutions can actually become stronger. Now we need a chemist to tell us what can happen to those particular acids in wine.

While all true in general, I doubt much of that applies to a wine that's been in what's essentially a large oak decanter for 30, 40, or 80+ years. Any oxygen-derived changes that are going to happen to the acidity are going to happen in barrel on an old Colheita... once you put it in glass it's going to be pretty stable for a very long time. Certainly longer than the 5-10 years that some claim causes a bottled tawny to degrade.

I've listened to people at blind tastings claim that a tawny tastes like it's been in bottle too long, only to find out it's only been 3 years on reveal. And I've also listened to people wax eloquently about how fresh and vibrant a tawny is, only to find out it was bottled 10 years ago.

Translation: I think it's mostly label bias derived from marketing. We've been told that you're supposed to drink a tawny as close to its bottling date as possible so that it won't degrade, so that's what people do and what they believe you should do. But that's what the producers want you to think so that you'll drink the bottle and then buy another one.

[Tom Archer]

I personally have very little enthusiasm for freshly bottled colheitas and other tawnies. How they age however does depend on the producer.

The Symington tawnies of recent years seem to be brutally processed and tend to age badly. The TFP wines fare rather better, but are not the stars of the show. Old Ferreira and Niepoort tawnies invariably show very well, but whilst the latter is committed to continue making age-worthy tawnies, one can never be quite certain when a producer is owned by a conglomerate. The producers have little financial interest in aging tawnies, and their bottling runs are usual sold to extinction, with nothing laid down and retained. It follows that there is no guarantee that their bottling practice of a generation ago will be repeated today.

My experience of Krohn colheitas is sullied by a very poor encounter with the '97, which has deterred me from buying more. It's not a widely marketed brand in the UK..

[Roy Hersh]

I agree with Andy's initial assessment, but as Glenn pointed out, "flat" is probably a different descriptor than I would use too. Otherwise, Andy is spot on in my opinion.


Glenn wrote:

While all true in general, I doubt much of that applies to a wine that's been in what's essentially a large oak decanter for 30, 40, or 80+ years. Any oxygen-derived changes that are going to happen to the acidity are going to happen in barrel on an old Colheita... once you put it in glass it's going to be pretty stable for a very long time. Certainly longer than the 5-10 years that some claim causes a bottled tawny to degrade.

First of all, I don't know that we can (or should) describe a TWAIOA (Tawny with an indication of age) and a Colheita the same way in discussions of acidity, in either. Glenn makes an important point to clarify that difference. But let me add a little comparison here.

Tawny Port, or TWAIOA, is a blend. We know by the 10/20/30/40+ indications of age on the label, approximately what the Master Blender perceives has the correct organoleptic characteristics to represent the blend of a Port that old. The acidity, even in a 40 year old Tawny Port will not change that significantly while the components are in neutral oak. It also depends on whether the components are refreshed and or topped off with identical vintage juice, and with regularity. We all know that it is somewhat "cheating" to refresh, but that really applies more specifically to a Colheita, (or definitively with Madeira) while it does remain true as well for TWAIOA.

The acidity in "Colheita" ... all of which comes from a single vintage and remains in wood, (as does frasqueira Madeira) however, if left in neutral pipes for many years, it will certainly change as the Port volume in cask does due to the evaporation, (aka: "angel's share"). As the reduction of the Colheita Port's volume takes place, the acidity within the wine tastes sharper and more accentuated, and if left to further oxidize for too long (untouched), it often times will turn volatile. That's why some producers "might" add younger cask-aged Ports to quickly try to refresh the acidity, which has already ... or may nearly be turning into volatile acidity (or VA).

Some really old Colheitas or Very Old Tawny Ports, may show more sophisticated character by allowing some trace amounts of VA to be intentionally allowed into a Colheita, as an added layer of complexity, in small doses. This is not usually something part of the recipe, but there are definitely producers that have used this technique in the past, and possibly today as well. Krohn's former owner told me that they never "refreshed" and always topped off. Some of their Colheitas seemed to taste like, what I described above. Regardless of that, the acidity in a wine bottle, (as Glenn asserted correctly) does not change it's pH level. It may be "perceived" to be more or less sharp, but Madeira offers the best example of this from "old in bottle" vs an older frasqueira (vintage) that hung out in wood for as long as possible, (e.g. D'Oliveiras). In the latter case, you can taste the difference, no question about that.

Niepoort Garrafeira is where Glenn's quote is not 100% accurate, but he was really talking about typical glass wine bottles, not demijohns where there is definitely a significant perceived change in the acidity within those special hand-blown glass vessels. But now we are getting into serious geek territory. Again, I do realize Glenn was talking about wine bottles when he mentioned "glass."


Glenn wrote:

We've been told that you're supposed to drink a tawny as close to its bottling date as possible so that it won't degrade, so that's what people do and what they believe you should do.

In these type of bottles where a TWAIOA, is cellared properly for a lot longer than the original producer ever intended, and then is consumed, there will certainly be a smoother and more dense mouthfeel. But like Andy mentioned, due to how the acidity melds into this dynamic of a wood-aged blended Tawny that has aged for decades beyond what was "intended", for my palate as well, the freshness is lost and while he mentioned "flat" my word would be "tired". Nonetheless, I had a Port exactly like this very recently, with 23 years of bottle age (1996 bottling) and it was the 20 Year Old (Single Quinta, Bom Retiro) Tawny by Ramos Pinto. It was extremely interesting and I actually enjoyed it quite a bit. But I did comment to others at the table that it seemed tired and that was when the date on this bottle was then checked. I wasn't surprised. But as Glenn alluded to in his comments on his last post, blind, we all can make the mistake in either direction.

Some people like old-in-bottle Colheitas, I generally do not. I prefer the fresh, and sharp character of a Krohn 1976 as an example. Or the 2005 bottling of 1952 Dalva Golden White that some of us used to go bonkers for. It is the same reason, I love Madeira. I am an acid freak when it comes to what I enjoy about dessert wines. It is why I rarely find wines like PX (Spanish Pedro Ximenez) too exciting and only can drink a small glass, or enjoy pouring it over coffee ice cream. Your mileage may vary.

Type which appears in red (above) was edited IN, at 2 p.m. Tuesday, after reading what I had written on my break from the newsletter in the wee hours.

[Eric Ifune]

Here we are, arguing about the chemistry of wine aging in glass and oak when the academic experts in the field acknowledge they don't know exactly what's going on!

[Roy Hersh]

Eric Ifune wrote:

Here we are, arguing about the chemistry of wine aging in glass and oak when the academic experts in the field acknowledge they don't know exactly what's going on!

Which is a nice way to say they are clueless ... and we are just clueless-speculation-experts with a modicum of empirical evidence when it comes to wood-aged Port's acidity?

[Tom Archer]

Here we are, arguing about the chemistry of wine aging in glass and oak when the academic experts in the field acknowledge they don't know exactly what's going on!

The problem with academic experts in any field is their extreme reluctance to engage in any form of research work that takes longer than a Phd course to complete.

In every field, the number of long term scientific research projects is a minuscule percentage of the total..

[Glenn E.]

Niepoort Garrafeira is where Glenn's quote is not 100% accurate, but he was really talking about typical glass wine bottles, not demijohns where there is definitely a significant perceived change in the acidity within those special hand-blown glass vessels. But now we are getting into serious geek territory. Again, I do realize Glenn was talking about wine bottles when he mentioned "glass."

Yep. Also, IIRC, Niepoort's Garrafeiras are put into demijohn relatively quickly. Isn't it something like 7 years? My comments were about wood-aged Ports that have 30, 40, or even 80+ years in wood and so should be much more stable at the time they are bottled than Niepoort's Garrafeiras are when they're put in demijohn.

[Heather Hathwell]

So..... in other words my last bottles of 1934 Niepoort Colheita, bought at auction a dozen years ago and which were amazing then, are now likely toast? (No idea when bottled.). So sad. This is the one problem with moving to Massachusetts 7 years ago. My wine is still stuck in California and I only occasionally get there to bring a case home.

[Glenn E.]

So..... in other words my last bottles of 1934 Niepoort Colheita, bought at auction a dozen years ago and which were amazing then, are now likely toast?

No, not at all! Niepoort's Colheitas are some of the ones we mostly agree will age nicely in bottle. Dirk Niepoort is a firm believer that Colheitas (his in particular) can age well and even improve in bottle, so your '34 should be fine. More than fine, really - that's an outstanding bottle of Port.

And as has been said here, even ones that aren't intended to age in bottle don't really "go bad" - they just change in ways that many people believe are less exciting than when freshly bottled.

[Eric Menchen]

So..... in other words my last bottles of 1934 Niepoort Colheita, bought at auction a dozen years ago and which were amazing then, are now likely toast?

No, not at all! Niepoort's Colheitas are some of the ones we mostly agree will age nicely in bottle. Dirk Niepoort is a firm believer that Colheitas (his in particular) can age well and even improve in bottle, so your '34 should be fine. More than fine, really - that's an outstanding bottle of Port.

Don't listen to Glenn. Those bottles are toast. Let me know where they are, and I will pick them up and dispose of them for you. mmmmm, toasty.