For The Love Of Port

I was rearranging some Ports in my cellar last night and was surprised by how few single bottles I have and thought about putting a case together of the singles that are left.

How about you ... do you have many "singletons" left hanging around?

Do you (or did you) buy single bottles, or has the natural drinking progression led to that?

I have lots of singles and pairs. I'm late to the Port collecting game, so mine were mostly purchased that way. The largest "lot" that I've ever purchased was one case of Kopke 40-yr old, after which there have been about half a dozen 6-packs. Then it's all 1's, 2's, and 3's.

As a matter of fact I do happen to have quite a few single bottles in the cellar. It seems that once I get down to the last bottle I tend to hold onto it and wait for some sort of occasion at which to open it.

I'm with Glenn on this one. My collection is approximately 50% singles, and I've yet to buy a full twelve of anything. I bought one sixer of something I knew I liked, and another of something that seemed a great bargain, but I haven't tasted enough or built up enough variety to buy more of one thing, yet.

I have lots of singles, perhaps 60 or 70, most of which are the last or only bottle from small purchases but a few are the last bottle from 6 or 12 packs. One bottle of "da Sliva LBV 1995" (Noval) is the last of 36

As a rule, most of my port collection is single bottles. Mostly because I lack the funds to purchase cases.

I have bought 12 psc. cases a few times of house ports for easy consumption, but nothing for storage.

-Lars

Probably a little under half of my purchases are single bottles, although I prefer not to buy single bottles unless they are for immediate drinking or something that is difficult to find. Only 6.8% of the bottles of port I own are single bottles, of which about 1/3rd are single because I drank all the others and 2/3rds are because I bought just a single bottle (like the lone bottle of unreleased Nacional 1999 that I managed to acquire!)

When I started buying Port, because of financial restriction, I was often buying only one bottle of Port. So I have quite a few singleton until the Vintage 2003 when I also started buying more from the producers I did like and less of of single bottles from t2 or t3 producers.

For a while, Warre's offered a case of their vintage ports -- an instant vertical! The restaurant where I get most of my wine got one and allowed me to cherry-pick it. All I have left is an '83 (our anniversary year).

I really only have multiples of one port : Nimrod. Everything else I have is singles.

I really have to find a source for ports to stock my cellar in anticipation of Roy's visit to the midwest next Christmas.

At this point, this relative newbie (3 years) is a singles and doubles kind of guy. Still no triples, but one of these days I hope to be a home run king with a walk-in cellar.