2003 Quinta do Noval Silval Vintage Port

[Todd Pettinger]

Quinta do Noval Silval Vintage Port – 2003
Decanted a surprising amount of sediment out of a very dark bottle with driven cork that came out in one piece with the Ah-so. Upon decanting, the nose was full of dark berries, grapes and some licorice. Heavy tannins with plums added to the palate. Dark red deepening to purple, yet not as stain-the-glass black as it’s bigger brother the Noval 2003 VP.

+2 hrs
Some chocolate is showing up on the palate, along with harsh, young, green, mouth-puckering tannins.

+4 hrs
More defined chocolate on the palate. The tannins are painfully prevalent at this point (young, very green, strong and in-your-face.) Combined with biting acidity, this results in a Port that is tough to enjoy at this stage, yet as predicted. I was predicting a rather long period of time in the decanter prior to being very drinkable.

+12 hrs
This was likely the worst showing time for this Port – it had a lot of powerful, astringent tannins. Chocolate is disappearing from the palate and being replaced with a harsh alcohol. The finish is short, clipped and extremely dry.

+1 day
Harsh Harsh Harsh tannins are now fully showing through. The fruit is disappearing into oblivion. There is little sweetness as was there to some extent in the first few hours of sampling.

+2 days
Some light chocolate notes are back in, and some cherries have shown up. A bit of dustiness on the mid-palate and some alcohol showing through detract from the overall enjoyment of the Port. I was having a lot of trouble getting much enjoyment out of the Port at this point and if I was rating it at this stage, it would be mid-80s (85-86.)

+3 days
Some fruit is back and the dustiness is gone. Plums and a bit of chocolate are present. Some light cherries are touch and go on the back palate. While there is still some alcohol, the dry finish is what surprised me the most. Fans of Dow will likely enjoy this Port once they get past the exceedingly hard tannins.

My rating for this 2nd label VP will be 86. It is not to my liking and while I may purchase one or two more bottles for longer-term storage to see what it does in a decade or two, it would only be if the price was reduced a bit.

[Todd Pettinger]

+3.5 days
It appears I may have been a bit hasty. About 7 hours after making the last note, I tipped back the remainder of the contents of the decanter (the fact that there is anything left in the decanter after 2 days demonstrates that this was not a big favourite of mine!) and came full circle, back to more fruit, much softer, mellow tannins, and very little abrasive alcohol. The chocolate has returned on both the nose and the palate and this latest evolution surely is the improvement I was hoping for previously.

I think that this improved version of the Silval is definitively better and is worthy of a full 3 points more than previously. While the style is overall still much more dry than I would have really preferred, the strong return of the fruit, the mellowing of the tannins and the disappearance of the alcohol makes this a 2nd label VP worthy of seeking out again.

Revised score: 89 pts.

Todd

[Bill Crann]

Todd,
Wow - great notes & data point. I have a half case of these and was thinking of trying one over the Christmas holiday out of curiosity. Sounds like this is VP that needs much integratation and time to mellow out. Not surprising considering it's only been a few years in bottle.

Regards,
Bill

[Derek T.]

A fantastic progressive note, Todd - this is how TN's should be written

...and congratulations on managing to make a bottle last long enough to take all those notes