For The Love Of Port

Initially he preferred the Graham's to the Dow ... take a look at his earlier reviews. Now, he's changed his mind, which is certainly his prerogative.

Here is a sneak preview of the buying guide for the May 31, 2010 issue of The Wine Spectator.

I know someone who had these in the right order right from cask samples on! You gotta love the long tasting windows. Come on, really? 15 years for the Graham's, really?


100 points: Dow Vintage Port 2007

Amazing aromas of lilac, violet, crushed blueberry and mineral that turn to black pepper and spices follow through to a full-bodied, medium-sweet palate, with a long, chewy finish. Evolves to tar and asphalt. Really held back, yet powerful grip slaps you. This is mind-blowing in texture. The greatest Dow ever made. Best after 2022.—J.S.


96 points: Graham Vintage Port 2007

Rich and chewy, with masses of blueberry, blackberry and raisin character. Full-bodied and very sweet, with a long, powerful finish. Big and juicy, with ultraripe fruit. Racy and full of class. Like cashmere. Best after 2018.—J.S.

I appologize for not mentioning that I was given a heads up from a FTLOP fan from Denmark:

Steen H. Rasmussen from the Vinhandler, The Wine Company www.thewinecompany.dk

I just had these two on Friday side by side in a blind tasting. Both excellent but I preferred the Graham's. His descriptions are right on but I liked the finish of the Graham's more--just exquisite, long lasting and held a good taste without being piquant (Of course, the Dows had a great finish, too).

I wish more critics would continue to re-taste and re-report new scores! Cheers to James Suckling for doing so.

We all know that bottle variation exists, so the fact that his numbers have moved a little bit don't bother me at all. In fact, it just proves to me that he knows what he's doing and isn't worried about his past numbers when re-tasting.

Dunno about 100 points, though... I liked the Dow a lot, but 100 points is a pretty big statement on such a young Port!

And you weren't even thinking about Port when he annointed the Fonseca 1977 w/100 points.

Roy Hersh wrote:And you weren't even thinking about Port when he annointed the Fonseca 1977 w/100 points.

I was barely even thinking about girls let alone Port back in 1979!

Actually Glenn, I was talking about when he first awarded his score, in his book in 1990. None of us was around drinking Port back in 1979, not even James.

Oh well that changes everything, I was already married in 1990!

Still wasn't thinking about Port, though. That took another 14 years!

Roy Hersh wrote:... None of us was around drinking Port back in 1979, not even James.

Ah, but Pete was. Might have been Thunderbird or Mad Dog 20/20 but it was called Port back in the 50s and 60s. I graduated from HS in 61.

Peter W. Meek wrote:

Roy Hersh wrote:... None of us was around drinking Port back in 1979, not even James.

Ah, but Pete was. Might have been Thunderbird or Mad Dog 20/20 but it was called Port back in the 50s and 60s. I graduated from HS in 61.

Luc wasn't, he was born in '62 .

Kudos to him for the re-evaluation.

I've preferred the Dow's to their other VP's and think it's probably the best the Symington's made in 2007. That said, while this is a stellar VP (and one of my overall favorites of the vintage) there is no way it's a 100 pointer

I believe that the entire 100 point scale is more an exercise in lemming psychology than anything meaningful. That last point--from 99 to 100--is worth many times more than the one that takes us from 90 to 91. The math is logarithmic, and any perfect score is a contradiction in terms. If I were to invent a scale, it probably would have a 99 point score, a 99.99 percent score, a 99.999 score, and so on. At least I'm 99 and 44/100ths percent sure, living here in Southern Ohio in Procter and Gambleland. smile. I realize that many, including myself, use a 100 point scale, as do most people on this forum, but I think most take it with a grain of sodium chloride.

I guess I must be showing my age. My first vintage port was a 1963 Sandeman drunk in 1975. I was blown away by it, even moreso than the 1970 Leoville and the 1970 Beycheville I had earlier that so much caught my heart that from that moment on, my fate was sealed. At least until that 1976 Beerenauslese from the Nahe...

On the subject of scales:

Any scale that can have have an extreme reached is defective. If anyone ever scores a wine at 100, a gymnastic performance at 10, then the scale is defective.

No matter how good something is, it should not be possible to rate it in such a way that no other example could ever be scored higher. Sorry; it simply doesn't make sense to assert that there can never, in the entire past, present, and future of the universe, be another example that should be scored higher. Period.

True Pete, but they can also be scored 100 points and be equals, kinda like these two -->

Roy Hersh wrote:True Pete, but they can also be scored 100 points and be equals, kinda like these two -->

I'm going to have to disagree with you on this one. Any scale that denies the possibility of one example being better than another example is defective. (IMHO) Once you rate ANY example at the top (or bottom) of a scale, the scale is broken.

One thing that has always puzzled me is why the 100 point scale "wastes" most of it's range. I believe I have never seen wines rated below about 70, and rarely below 80. Surely there are some poor-but-drinkable plonks that could usefully be rated in the 20s 30s or 40s. I seem to recall you (or someone here) saying that under 80 is undrinkable. If so, why are all those numbers available? Or is it really a 20 point scale which simply has 80 added to each score for some unfathomable reason?

If I had to guess, it is to allow people to rate wines as less than good without being insulting to someone you might want to ask a favor from next year. "Hey, I gave your wine an 80. That's not so bad on a scale of 100."

And yes, we can disagree and be

Peter W. Meek wrote:On the subject of scales:

Any scale that can have have an extreme reached is defective. If anyone ever scores a wine at 100, a gymnastic performance at 10, then the scale is defective.

No matter how good something is, it should not be possible to rate it in such a way that no other example could ever be scored higher. Sorry; it simply doesn't make sense to assert that there can never, in the entire past, present, and future of the universe, be another example that should be scored higher. Period.

Pete
I HAVE to disagree on that one.
That implies you couldn't ever give 5 stars on a 5 star scale either!
Or a bit more rigorously, it means you have a max potential of 99 (using a 100 point scale) for the best wine you've ever tasted. Then tomorrow you have one that's better (lucky you) - what do you score it? If you give it 99 then, presumably, you 'should' have scored the previous best at 98. Oops, that means you can never give a 99 score in case a better wine comes along, so your max is really 98....... the extension to this is readily apparent. (Reductio ad absurdum if I recall my math classes correctly).


Just accept it appears to be a scale that can be 'rounded to the nearest integer' (regardless of whether it's linear, exponential, or imaginary).

Is it possible that a Vintage Port will be the WS wine of the year again?
Whether you agree with the idea or not, it does get people talking; and hopefully tasting; more Port.

I understand Peter's point, but I'll still use the 100 point scale for wines. I think it is flawed, but it is something of a standard and we understand it. Peter would like to be able to rank any and all wines relative to each other, which really suggests we need a decimal rating. A five star scale would only allow ranking 5 wines (or six if 0 stars is an option), and even a 100 point scale fully utilized would only allow ranking 100. So should we switch to a 0-1 range? "I think this is better than the 0.93 wine, but not quite as good as the 0.9325, so I'll give it a 0.932." I don't think my memory is that good, nor my palate that consistent.

I judged beers again last weekend. Friday night had some interesting ones, and I think my scores were in the mid twenties to maybe 40 on a 50 point scale. Saturday I judged a flight of American Pale Ales that were all about the same, high 20s to mid 30s. I am currently a "Recognized" BJCP judge, and with this weekend I may now be "Certified". I need to check my points. I've never had a 50 point beer using the BJCP scoring system.

As an new guy, but also a math guy I am amused by the rating system conventions used. The scale is not really 1 to 100 where an average wine should be 50 and a pretty good one should be 75--or even 50 to 100. The scale really is 80 to 100 and it's more convention, than math. It understandable given human factors (who wants to buy a 70 point wine on a 100 scale?--we all want great ones, don't we.) and the tendency for grade inflation on any scale (For my port friends, we use a 1-10 scale, so average should be 5.5, but it is 6.8 and I'm usually reminding people about grade inflation. So be it.)

Anyway, the ratings are all relative anyway and we all understand the convention and I see no reason to "fight city hall" but I will say this as to the 100. (1) why not rate an outstanding port a 100? Perfection is not possible, but awesome is awesome and wouldn't you feel better about it. You could say.."I drank a 100 point port today". I'd feel great about that. (2) I understand wanting to leave room in the scale for a better one, but let me ask you this. If you went through your tasting notes and found all the ones you scored say 95, got new bottles and had a taste-off. Don't you think you'd like one slightly better than the others even though they're all 95s? Same could be done with 100s.

OK. I back down. I eat crow. I bury my head in shame.

Taking the example of the 5-star scale, I guess I can accept a scale with "ends" and containing examples that reach those ends, but it still doesn't feel right that so many wines (and other rated things) get rated at the high end of a scale with a lot of room (like a 100 point scale, even though we have established that it is really a 20 point scale). I would like to think that experienced tasters like Roy or Suckling would adjust their scales so that they would expect to find only one or two "extreme" wines in a lifetime.

If you look at a bell curve, I would expect it to require thousands of samples, on average, for every extreme case on a long scale. Maybe experienced tasters really do end up rating 100s (or 20s) only that often. Plus there is the skewing factor: experienced tasters seek out the better wines, and may experience them a higher percentage of the time than the average person. Plus an additional skewing factor: presumably wine makers attempt to make extremely good wines and succeed at times.