For The Love Of Port

I don't think Roy has finalized his dates yet.

Thanks to a link from another thread, I have just been reading through this one. An intruiging idea, even if the bottles were decanted from small to large after 25 years or so. I hopped on to the Boisdale Belgravia website to see if it was still listed, but nothing there; I wonder if it was ever drunk - does anybody know?

The statement at the start of their port menu surprised me:

Boisdale Belgravia wine list wrote:Some of these old Port houses no longer exist; many are absurdly rare. They are opened at the customers risk & will not be refunded in the extremely unlikely event that they are for any reason out of condition. We justify this on the basis that they are extraordinarily good value & it is worth the punt to make tasting history!

All of the wines on their list are from houses which still exist, and the price of a bottle of Fonseca '96 is £120. To be fair they do have some rare bottles listed (D45 @ £1950, RP28 @ £1450).

I think when they said "extremely unlikely," they meant "fairly likely."

Funny thing, when Andy was here recently, (for the 1985 VP horizontal in January) we were discussing this particular bottle of Dow's. As I've had it twice in 750 ml, it would've been great to go "all in" for a big dinner with this Port being served early and often.

I believe the questions about provenance and the lack of any guarantee that if it was corked, otherwise faulty or DOA, that we wouldn't have to pay for it, prevented us from moving forward with the plan to execute this VP.

This bottle was filled about 25 years after the harvest by pouring 20 ordinary bottles into a biggie for a party intended to happen shortly after the re-bottling. I have some faith that the original small bottles were Dow 1896; but no faith at all in the care and hygiene of the re-bottling. Happy for others to risk £10k ≈ $15.4k ≈ €13.5k (please post a tasting note), but not me. And I suspect that isn’t far from the general consensus.

Roy Hersh wrote: I believe the questions about provenance and the lack of any guarantee that if it was corked, otherwise faulty or DOA, that we wouldn't have to pay for it, prevented us from moving forward with the plan to execute this VP.

Would you accept a 50% refund on "if it was corked, otherwise faulty or DOA" deal?

Julian D. A. Wiseman wrote:This bottle was filled about 25 years after the harvest by pouring 20 ordinary bottles into a biggie for a party intended to happen shortly after the re-bottling. I have some faith that the original small bottles were Dow 1896; but no faith at all in the care and hygiene of the re-bottling.

This was the deal-killer for me when we were originally talking about it. IMHO, there's zero chance that this wine is any good, given that it was expected to be used immediately. It's unlikely it was rebottled under pristine conditions to prevent oxidation from begging to occur.

John Danza wrote:

Julian D. A. Wiseman wrote:This bottle was filled about 25 years after the harvest by pouring 20 ordinary bottles into a biggie for a party intended to happen shortly after the re-bottling. I have some faith that the original small bottles were Dow 1896; but no faith at all in the care and hygiene of the re-bottling.

This was the deal-killer for me when we were originally talking about it. IMHO, there's zero chance that this wine is any good, given that it was expected to be used immediately. It's unlikely it was rebottled under pristine conditions to prevent oxidation from begging to occur.

Is it wax sealed?

Moses Botbol wrote:

John Danza wrote:

Julian D. A. Wiseman wrote:This bottle was filled about 25 years after the harvest by pouring 20 ordinary bottles into a biggie for a party intended to happen shortly after the re-bottling. I have some faith that the original small bottles were Dow 1896; but no faith at all in the care and hygiene of the re-bottling.

This was the deal-killer for me when we were originally talking about it. IMHO, there's zero chance that this wine is any good, given that it was expected to be used immediately. It's unlikely it was rebottled under pristine conditions to prevent oxidation from begging to occur.

Is it wax sealed?

I don't know, but I doubt that matters. The act of pouring the small bottles into the large bottle is all it's going to take for the degradation to start. I don't know how they would have done the bottling to prevent air from starting to do its thing on the wine.

John Danza wrote: I don't know, but I doubt that matters. The act of pouring the small bottles into the large bottle is all it's going to take for the degradation to start. I don't know how they would have done the bottling to prevent air from starting to do its thing on the wine.

Isn't that what happens with Garrafeira?

John Danza wrote:I don't know, but I doubt that matters. The act of pouring the small bottles into the large bottle is all it's going to take for the degradation to start. I don't know how they would have done the bottling to prevent air from starting to do its thing on the wine.

I doubt they did what I'm going to describe, but if can be done. Fill big bottle with nitrogen (or argon, or CO2). Use gas under pressure (just slightly higher than the pressure in the big bottle) to push wine out of bottles through tubing into the big bottle through a device that has a one way gas relief. I have a device that does the filling side of this for beer, a counter-pressure filler. You could construct a similar device with a few changes of plumbing to be the "drainer," kind of like the Coravin.

Moses Botbol wrote:

John Danza wrote: I don't know, but I doubt that matters. The act of pouring the small bottles into the large bottle is all it's going to take for the degradation to start. I don't know how they would have done the bottling to prevent air from starting to do its thing on the wine.

Isn't that what happens with Garrafeira?

Same concept, but I think Garrafeira wines spend a lot more time in wood before they hit the demijohn. I would also think the winery is exercising some care to prevent the transfer from being damaging. I don't know that this fits with the bottle in question. But if you want to give it a try and report back, that would be great!

Eric Menchen wrote:I doubt they did what I'm going to describe, but if can be done. Fill big bottle with nitrogen (or argon, or CO2). Use gas under pressure (just slightly higher than the pressure in the big bottle) to push wine out of bottles through tubing into the big bottle through a device that has a one way gas relief. I have a device that does the filling side of this for beer, a counter-pressure filler. You could construct a similar device with a few changes of plumbing to be the "drainer," kind of like the Coravin.

In an Irish stately home, circa 1920?

Who done it? The butler, in the cellar, with the candlestick.

How about just topping the bottle with olive oil and sucking it out of the bottle before pouring?

You can add a bit of SO2 at the "re bottling" as you would at bottling to mitigate some of the oxidation, but heaven knows whether that was done considering the timeframe planned for the bottl


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It is a decent possibility that the wine is still delicious though, as it seems every big tasting of port I've attended, there's always a couple examples of VP that are delicious in a tawny-esque way.


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Bradley Bogdan wrote:It is a decent possibility that the wine is still delicious though, as it seems every big tasting of port I've attended, there's always a couple examples of VP that are delicious in a tawny-esque way.


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As long as you pay for it I'll come and let you know what I think of it

Andy Velebil wrote:

Bradley Bogdan wrote:It is a decent possibility that the wine is still delicious though, as it seems every big tasting of port I've attended, there's always a couple examples of VP that are delicious in a tawny-esque way.


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As long as you pay for it I'll come and let you know what I think of it

When I make my first million at work, I promise that's how we'll celebrate. :-P


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No one has answered my original question though - is it still there?
(it is not on their wine list)

Phil W wrote:No one has answered my original question though - is it still there?
(it is not on their wine list)

Phone and ask.

Or let us enjoy the pretence that it’s still there.