Port wines full#

Port wines full#

Vintage port wine is characterized by its intense red color, full body and complexity of flavor. Aged tawny port may be labeled as 10, 20 or 30 years old, referring to the average age of its blend of old and young wines. Its aroma and flavor characteristics are the craft of a master blender, the person who creates the uniqueness of each of these wines. This famous port wine pales to an amber color as it ages. The lighter tawnies have been blended with white port. It is blended from wines of different years, usually no more than three years old. This port wine is less sweet and lighter than ruby or vintage ports. The tawnies are lighter in taste and color than the rubies, but they are all blended from several wines. Once bottled, they are ready for drinking and, unless unfiltered, do not require decanting. Most Popular Styles of Portos (Ports) in the MarketĪll ports, aside from vintage, are matured in oak casks. These vines grow in terraces along the steep riverbanks, and their grapes are harvested annually between September 15 and October 15. The vine roots grow very deep down through the fissures in the schist to find water in natural reservoirs. There are five main grape varieties known for their superb quality-Touriga Nacional, Tinta Roriz, Tinta Barroca, Tinto Cao and Touriga Francesa-and they grow in a predominantly schistous, rocky and acidic soil. What gives Porto its unique quality, aroma and flavor are the original combination of soil, climate and grapes found in Portugal’s Upper Douro River Valley, which stretches 62 miles to the Spanish border.

Presently, the Porto Wine Institute and the Casa do Douro oversee its production and guarantee quality control. The juice is then moved into 115-gallon oak casks (pipas) where it matures. Fermentation of the grapes occurs in large stainless steel tanks, and after fermentation is stopped the mixture is allowed to settle for a few months in large oak vats. This rich and fortified Porto is now obtained by adding 20 percent brandy (aguardente) to the liquid volume to arrest fermentation, and to maintain about 10 percent of the residual sugar. The reasons for its original sweetness lay in the exceptional ripeness of that vintage, which naturally allowed some of the grape sugars to remain. The origins of modern-day Porto date back to 1820, when that particular harvest yielded a very sweet and rich wine. Some of the Portuguese traditional wine estates, called quintas, are Ferreira and Quinta do Infantado. The more well-known names include Graham, Cockburn, Warre, Taylor, Krohn, Niepoort, Dow and Churchill. Croft was one of the first big shippers, followed by other English and Scottish firms, and much of the port trade is still in British control. One of these founders, Joseph Forrester, obtained the title of baron in 1855 for his efforts at modernizing the port trade. Most of the port wines are blended and aged in a large number of the wineries in Vila Nova de Gaia, a town located across the Douro river from Porto city, with some featuring English names, attesting to the British origins of their founders. In the middle 1750s, the Portuguese authorities started controlling all the aspects of port wine production, including the demarcation of the boundaries of the Douro region. The Douro Valley region produces the grapes that give rise to the only authentic “Porto”. Only after the British discovered port wine at the end of the 17 th century did the fame of its fine quality start spreading all over the world.

The Home of Port Wine Last Updated: November 11, 2021