Krohn Colheita 61 - storage

[Fred A]

:help: I'd be very grateful if someone could tell me for how long these babes can be stored - assuming they are stored:

1. in room temperature
2. in the fridge
3. in a 12 degree (Celsius) wine cellar
4. some other suitable way

[Glenn E.]

Fred,

Conventional wisdom says that tawny ports don't improve with age in the bottle. I'm not sure that wisdom is correct.

My admittedly limited experience with Colheitas is that they will keep in bottle for a very long time if stored properly. A wine cellar or wine refrigerator at 12-15 degrees Celsius (53-59 degrees Fahrenheit) is an excellent way to preserve them.

I have half a dozen bottles of the 1964 Krohn White Colheita that I intend to keep for many years and drink over time on my birthday. I'll be keeping a case of 1964 Noval Colheita and a few bottles of 1964 Dow's Grand Reserve for the same purpose. I have a high-end wine refrigerator that I'm using to store them. Provided I can keep my hands off of them, some of those bottles are going to end up being stored for 20+ years before I drink them!

[Andy Velebil]

Fred,

Welcome to the forum, it's nice to have you with us. When you get a chance it would be great to introduce yourself to the group HERE

Glenn has given sound advice. I assume you want to store them un-opened? If so, then the best way is what Glenn mentioned, store them in a proper wine cellar that keeps them at about 55-60 degrees with humidity around the 70% range. The vibration in a regular refridgerator is fine for short term and won't do any harm, but I'd be leary about long term storage. Plus regular refridgerators don't have much humidity which will dry out the cork faster and could eventually lead to leakage and premature oxidation.

Again, welcome and I look forward to your further involvement here.

[Roy Hersh]

It is nice to have another Fred joining the ranks of and I welcome you aboard too!

There is an ongoing debate about Tawny Port and Colheita Port's ability to age in bottle. The Port trade recommends that 10/20/30/40 year old Tawny Ports, known in the trade as, "Tawny Port with an indication of age" are best consumed when they are fresh and soon after bottling. I've never seen/heard anyone in the trade say anything different. However, there are some Port enthusiasts that have commented here in the past that they disagree, and do find that aging these types of Tawnies is not only achievable, but desireable. Personally, I still think the jury is out on this particular question.

As to Colheita Ports. There is a fine schism in the belief about these Ports too. Some Colheita producers state clearly that the most current bottlings are fresher and that the Colheitas do not age once bottled. There are others, most notably Dirk Niepoort, who is emphatic in his belief that Colheitas definitely do age well AND actually improve in the bottle. I personally side with the latter belief as I've spent lots of my time experimenting and tasting hundreds of old and somewhat newer Colheitas.

Your mileage may vary. Obviously, anything that retards the oxidation process, as lowering the ambient temperature will do, is good for the aging outcome of any wine and Port is no exception.

Thanks for joining us and we hope you will become an integral part of our community!

[Derek T.]

Roy,

Your post above sparked a question in my head. Conventional wisdom suggests that port, or any wine, will "age" faster at higher temperatures. There is also the general rule that consistent temperature, provided it is not in the extreme ranges, is better than fluctuations. So, should we obtain a small batch of bottles of the same Colheita (or Tawny?) and "age" the bottles for a period of time at different stable temperatures and then taste them all at the same time to determine whether or not they are capable of improving with age?

I am willing to offer myself up as a taster

Derek

[Andy Velebil]

It also brings up an interesting debate. I do think that some, but not all, colheita's do get better with bottle age. But for how long I don't know. It would really depend on the producer as some of them seem to fine/filter their colheita's more than others. Aging potential would really depend on how much they have stripped it during that filtration.

I'd also say that older colheita's don't seem to age as well as their younger counterparts. From the limited amount that I've had, I'd say a good percentage didn't seem to be as fresh as they should have been. Don't know if that is a product of already aging for so long in wood and losing lots of their sediment already. Where the younger ones still have lots left to still lose and form sediment in bottle. Again, filtration would come into play here as well.

[Moses Botbol]

I had a couple of bottles of Ramos Pinto 10 & 20 Tawny that were in the bottle ten years. They were not as fresh or "powerful" tasting as recent bottled version. They did not taste bad at all, but not at all the same as a fresh bottled tawny, so I would have to agree with traditional wisdom on this.

Last night I had two bottles of Broadbent 10 Madeira. One just opened, another that had been open two weeks. Both were great, but the new bottle was just so much more intense in every department.

[Glenn E.]

Last night I had two bottles of Broadbent 10 Madeira.

:help:

[Moses Botbol]

Last night I had two bottles of Broadbent 10 Madeira.

:help:

Along with the 2000 Cado and some CA cab that my friend brought over...