For The Love Of Port

From where I sit and with discussions with friends in Portugal and Denmark as well as loads of people here in the USA and Canada too, it seems like most people, especially those unfortunately not working ... have upped their game in terms of Port drinking.

So, I have arranged a fun little poll to see where people are at with their Port consumption. Please do feel free to comment in the thread here too! Oh yeah, you can choose up to 3 options and can even vote again.

I hope everybody is well and that you and your family have been able to remain safe and healthy!

I think my port consumption has increased over last year
This is primarily due to having more port nights with my significant other and my 18 yr old daughter
In fact our port consumption has increased by 57 % compared to this time last year

Bought a case of 10 & 20 tawny at giveaway pricing; so port has been free flowing in 2020. Down to the last bottle of that purchase. Need to figure out the next purchase for the holiday season and 2021.

My port consumption has been significantly lower, but this is due to the fact that we tend to share the ports with friends, and/or during times when people might be over or visiting, etc. And since we have not had people over, nor hosted nary any dinners nor visitors due to the health crisis, we haven't opened up much of anything at all. Same goes for madeira, scotch and rum for that matter.

Sounds like it's time for an early New Year's resolution!

My consumption is up, but really I am not drinking higher or lower quality--I'm just drinking from my cellar as usual in that regard.

And while I haven't hosted people indoors for any dinners, I've opened a few bottles which I split and delivered half to some friends.

I went with the first option. I'm drinking a lot more Port than usual, but because of that I'm not opening "epic" bottles every time. It's not that the quality has intentionally gone down, it's just that when the only bottles you open are for big tastings you tend to only open great stuff. So yeah, the quality has gone down, but it's because I'm "drinking" more Port now rather than just "tasting" it at gatherings.

I mean... we've been drinking a lot of big name producers from the '70s and '80s during the pandemic... that's not exactly poor quality stuff!

No more Port and Madeira than before, but more table wines.

Eric Ifune wrote: ↑Mon Nov 02, 2020 5:16 pm No more Port and Madeira than before, but more table wines.

Probably this. I haven't tracked it, but for sure more table wines. Though I did get a number of cases of Graham's 10 yr tawny cheap at auction to use as my house chilled-summer Port and those were gone before the summer was out. So maybe I did drink more port...

Eric Ifune wrote: ↑Mon Nov 02, 2020 5:16 pm No more Port and Madeira than before, but more table wines.

same here. i tend to open vintage or lbv ports when i have visitors. and that didn't happen.

(i'm still thinking about option 6)

I am for sure drinking more table wine that normally, but I have not fallen off the port train. I have actually increased the quality of wine I open as I like to spoil myself and my guests on every occasion I get a chance.

Hmm..

None of the options seemed valid. I'm drinking slightly more port this year, but the average value is about the same.

I've drunk very little beer this year, but loads more wine

I’m on track to pull about 3 times as many corks this year as I did last year but somehow seem to have balanced this by also acquiring 3 times as many bottles as I did last year.

The bottles I’ve been opening have probably been smaller than usual on average, a lot more 37.5cl, 20cl and 9cl bottles, but the quality range has been broadly the same. I also used 2020 as a reason to open quite a few bottles from the 1920 vintage, but only when I’ve been able to share them with others.

And, like others, my table wine consumption is multiples more than last year, but I only drank 15 bottles last year. Maybe it’ll be about 3 times that this year.