TN's: 1980, 1983 and 1985 Ports with Roy Hersh in ATL

[Don Cornutt]

Last week I had a chance to attend a nice port vertical lead by Roy Hersh here in ATL.
A local wine school brought him in to do a vertical tasting of 5 top producers from 1980,1983 and 1985.
Roy brought a mystery wine along also.

A very educational tasting to say the least. Only a few of the wines really blew me away. Some good ports but only a
very few that were great. (It just so happened that one was Roy's mystery wine.)

These notes are after the fact and from memory so take them with a grain of salt.

Flight One

1980

Fonseca

Light orange color with browning at the rim. What a nose. Apricots and cinnamon. Gorgeous and sexy. The palate
doesn't quite deliver this. Some fruit that was a little drying on the finish. I liked this one quite a bit because of the
nose.

Taylor

Dark fruit and a hint of mint. Roy calls is eucalyptus. I can understand that. Dark fruit with a spine
of spicy notes. The wine is very properly balanced and
nice to drink. Nice finish that does build a little.

Grahams

The nose on this one showed corked. Flawed

Warres

Dark fruit and some element of coffee. The palate is so dense but provides lots of pleasure. Pretty long finish.
This is quite nice. This one shows very young.

Dow

Dark and brooding on the nose and palate. This one just never gets off the ground. Probably a very good port at some point.



Flight Two

1983

Fonseca

Darker color. Spice and cinnamon on the nose again. Good spice on the palate. This one finishes just a tad short.

Taylor

A profuse nose of dark spicy fruit that is obliterated by mint. This carries through in an almost herbal way on the palate. I liked it.
Roy really doesn't like this wine. Not a great Taylor for sure.

Graham's

Corked again but less so than the 1980. Flawed but drinkable. Probably was an ok wine.

Warre

Very dark berry fruit with moccha type of influences on the nose and palate. The palate is so dense and finishes with very good spicy detail. Another very good port.
These Warre's are pretty good!

Dow

Better nose here. Dark fruit and some element of briary spice. The palate is full and shows pretty good detail on the finish.
In the same style as the Warre but not as detailed to me.


Flight Three

1985

Fonseca

Dense and spicy fruit on the nose and palate. This wine is wound up with incredible detail. The finish is extremely long.
A terrific wine in the making. Fabulous.

Taylor

Denser black fruit here and minty spice. The palate is a little disjointed with alcohol. Nice finish.

Grahams

Reticent nose. An extremely sweet and dense palate. A wonderful presence in the mouth and finish. I like this quite a bit
even though it is incredibly sweet.

Warre

Dense dark fruit. Some spice. Coffee. The palate is a little monolithic right now. Great finish however.

Dow

Dense and dark. Nice finish. Same profile as the Warre but it just doesn't finish as well.


Mystery Wine

Dark maroon color with a little browning. The nose is intoxicating. Dense waves of spicy fruit followed by a slight
minty aroma. The palate shows incredible detail. The best of the tasting. The length is monumental. It goes on and on.
This is something extremely special.


The wine...

1977 Taylor Fladgate Porto

Wow!

Thanks Roy.

A great education and wonderful tasting lead by one of the true master's of port.

Cheers,

Don

[Paul David]

Nice notes Don. Thanks for posting.
I popped the cork on a 1980 Graham yesterday. A bottle I intended to serve this evening during a presentation I am conducting on Port. While there was a whiff of what I hoped was just bottle funk, by this morning the TCA ginnie has completely gotten hold of the bottle. Thankfully a back up has been in the big decanter all day showing good promise. There seem to me to be an alarming increase in early 80's grahams which are tainted.

[David Spriggs]

Don,
Thanks for the notes! I enjoyed reading through them! That is a shockingly high number of corked bottles! Sorry to see that.
-Dave-

[Roy Hersh]

Very strange occurrence. The thread that was pulled up was from a year ago. This past weekend, was a 1963 Horizontal Tasting with many of the same folks while I was visiting Atlanta again. David, it was a strange showing of TCA and I was amazed because the guy who runs the wine school who held that tasting had procured these VPs from a number of top sources.

[John Baskam]

Roy - Enjoyed the read on the 1963 Ports on another forum. It looks like you had a terrific evening, even with the poor showing bottles. I appreciate you spreading the Port good news whenever possible. I continue to learn a lot. Regards, John