1985 Burmester Vintage Port

[David Spriggs]

Medium ruby color. Some significant bricking. A beautiful nose of black cherries, mahogany, and vanilla. Full bodied palate,. This mouthfeel is so suave and viscous. Wow. You just want it to linger in your mouth. Excellent acidity. Outstanding! I have had a lot of 1985 Burmester VPs. So many of have been leaking, poorly stored, etc. But this is the best bottle that I can recall. Just ethereal. 95 points.

[John M.]

Thanks for the note...I have some of these! Very Happy!

[Mike J. W.]

Great review. I have 2 (thanks John). I'll have to try one soon.

[Will W.]

I am a fan of Burmester ports and, indeed, Burmester colheitas. The difficulty I have found with the VPs from the 1980s is that the incidences of cork taint are so frequent that I gave up a while back buying anything bottled in the 1980s.

[David Spriggs]

The difficulty I have found with the VPs from the 1980s is that the incidences of cork taint are so frequent that I gave up a while back buying anything bottled in the 1980s.

I'm not going to disagree with that. I have had many corked 1980's VPs.

[Eric Menchen]

I loved this the first time I tried it 2008, so I went out and bought six bottles. Most of those have been disappointing compared to that first experience, which was more like yours here. I have one left, and you give me hope that it might shine.

[Glenn E.]

I still have one of these left as well, and it was purchased at the same time as the one we opened in 2015 for the 1985 horizontal. I started out at 90 on that one, but by the time I was done I had lowered it all the way to 86. So I hope my remaining bottle shows more like yours! To be fair, I also noted there was something weird going on with my palate at that tasting, so I'm not too concerned about the remaining bottle.

I thought I'd also had one more recently (during COVID) that I liked better, but I can't find a note for it.

[Andy Velebil]

Sounds like a lot of bottle variation in this one. Is that a correct assessment of people's encounters with it?

[Eric Menchen]

Sounds like a lot of bottle variation in this one. Is that a correct assessment of people's encounters with it?

Yes, for me at least.

[Glenn E.]

Sounds like a lot of bottle variation in this one. Is that a correct assessment of people's encounters with it?

I used to think it was pretty consistent (just not that great), but now David's TN has me hoping that I've just been unlucky so far!

[David Spriggs]

Sounds like a lot of bottle variation in this one. Is that a correct assessment of people's encounters with it?

Most definitely. If this one bottle was representative, we would all be talking about it like it's 1994 Vesuvio. Unfortunately it's not.