1994 Rozes Vintage Port

[alec]

After 3 hours of decanting:

Deep garnet color with a slight amber edge. Bit cloudy, but that could be my lack of great decanting skills. Nose of charcoal and tar, fruit begins to emerge. Light fruit, though, rasberry, strawberry....peach? Yes, peach.. or apricot. A little grapey, almost of blaufrankish. That would be fine except I hate the blaufrankish grape. A hint of mint.

Wonderful mouthfeel. Soft, warm, lush. Slightly baked quality but it's not taking away from the overall experience. Alcohol is still a litte high, but I'm guessing that will improve over time. Pleasant finish, if not a little hot. Let's see what more time will do.

--A

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I left a bit in my glass for another hour now. The port in the decanter now reaks strongly of the blaufrankish smell. (If anyone can tell me what that smell is I'd appreciate it. Is it "vegetal"?)

HOWEVER, the wine in the glass is losing that nose and is developing a wonderful chocolate fudge quality. There's a bit of spiciness in there as well. Good acidity is balancing out the sweetness. Some remaining tanins tell me this will last for another few years. (The cork gave me a different message, but I'm hoping that's an isolated problem.) This is ending up in the 87 - 89 area for me. At $40/bottle I may get a couple more. I'm going to keep a nose on the decanter for a while longer and see if that improves any.

--A

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Followup: the blaufrankish smell has disappeared and was replaced with a very plainly grapey nose. Took about 10 hours of decanting for that to happen. Became a better port night 2.

[Otto Nieminen]

Thanks for the note! I tried this recently and also noted a slight inkiness to the scent - which I commonly also find in Blaufränkisch, but I didn't think of this similarity at the time. But as I don't mind the grape, I found this a rather nice port also. Unfortunately it was at a large tasting so I couldn't monitor its development. But, happily, it was served side by side with the '91 and '97 and I think the '94 had the edge on them.

Cheers,
Otto

[alec]

Inkiness.... Thanks, Otto, that's a better description for it. I'm glad to hear someone else had a similar experience because it was driving me mad! Also, thanks for the spelling correction on Blaufränkisch...

--A