For The Love Of Port

I have been trying to get a better reading on the amount of sugar, let's say in grams per litre, in vintage ports, and my Internet reasearch gets me nothing except for a bunch of unreliable comments from people who barely know what Port is. I can find no technical data or spec sheets on specific wines, and nothing on the issue of the evolution of sugar in the bottle during the aging process. If I'm going to go to a 1960s Port luncheon/dinner next month and try to keep my blood sugar from making me too sweet even for the vampires that inhabit portions of NYC, I've got to at least determine what ranges of RS to expect so that I can do some calculations. Any thoughts?

Jay,

I can't help with this from where I am but I own lots of books, some of which will contain the answer to your question. I will be re-united with them on Thursday and will look then if no one gives you an answer before that.

I am sure I remember seeing some technical data in PDF downloads on a major producers' website a few years ago but have looked at all the usual suspects and can't find anything. Your best hope for a definitive answer is for a wine-maker to see this thread and give you the full technical answer.

Derek

What I recall having been told by various sources jives with what I just found with a bit of googling - that Port typically contains between 70 and 80 grams of sugar per liter.

The USDA rates dessert wines, which include Port, at 7.78 g sugar per 100 g liquid. That falls handily into the range of what I've been told before. Many dessert wines contain more sugar than Port, though, so I can easily believe that Port ranges down to 70 g/l.

I've sent an email to a couple of friends in the trade who will hopefully be able to give us the definitive answer

The Sweet and Fortified Wine Association says that American port-style wine contains 60-85 g/l.

(It actually says it contains 6-8.5% sugar... I'm converting everything I find to the standard grams/liter.)

Jay Hack wrote:I have been trying to get a better reading on the amount of sugar, let's say in grams per litre, in vintage ports, and my Internet reasearch gets me nothing except for a bunch of unreliable comments from people who barely know what Port is. I can find no technical data or spec sheets on specific wines, and nothing on the issue of the evolution of sugar in the bottle during the aging process. If I'm going to go to a 1960s Port luncheon/dinner next month and try to keep my blood sugar from making me too sweet even for the vampires that inhabit portions of NYC, I've got to at least determine what ranges of RS to expect so that I can do some calculations. Any thoughts?

a wine maker can chime in with more specifics

but according to a broken link
http://www.nysaes.cornell.edu/fst/facul ... sweet.html

Portuguese Ports: 6-8 Brix, 17-19% alcohol.

my understanding is that 1 degree of brix = 10g of sugar/Liter

so 6-8 Brix would mean potentially 45g to 60g of sugar per 750 ml bottle.

That sounds about right to me as I know most sauternes are around the 40g residual sugar mark

oh 25 ounces in a single 750ml bottle

so yer looking at 2-3 g of sugar per ounce.

a typical tasting glass has 2 ozs so 4-6 g of sugar per tasting glass.

25.4 oz per 750 ml

Roy Hersh wrote:25.4 oz per 750 ml

!!!

you don't pre rinse the decanter!?!

Well, based upon the above (some of which would give my chemistry professor a heart attack for the inaccurate assumptions), if we assume 80 gms of sugar per litre of Port (which seems to be towards the high end of the estimates I have collected), then there are 2.4 grams of sugar per ounce of Port. That's not nearly as bad as I thought. It should allow 8 one-ounce pours over the course of a few hours with no problems, and might allow 8 one-and-one-half-ounce pours without a big issue except for a minute or two of jumping jacks every half hour, assuming no other carbs. I think the strategy is to take the larger pours, which is still less than normal, drink no more than an ounce each during the first two hours, test blood for glucose level, and then decide on the rest.

Jay Hack wrote:(some of which would give my chemistry professor a heart attack for the inaccurate assumptions)

I was rounding off for ease of computation in my head. I'm aware that wine doesn't weigh exactly the same as pure water, but I think it's close enough for our purpose here.

Jay Hack wrote:I think the strategy is to take the larger pours, which is still less than normal, drink no more than an ounce each during the first two hours, test blood for glucose level, figure out how many jumping jacks to do, and then [strikethrough]decide on[/strikethrough]finish the rest.

There I fixed it for ya.

Glenn E. wrote:

Jay Hack wrote:I think the strategy is to take the larger pours, which is still less than normal, drink no more than an ounce each during the first two hours, test blood for glucose level, figure out how many jumping jacks to do, and then [strikethrough]decide on[/strikethrough]finish the rest.

There I fixed it for ya.

I was going to say, "Put on the boxing gloves, beat the crap out of the rest of the guys, and take it all for myself."

Jay, actually in average is a little bit more than 70 or 80 grams. Red Port varies from 100g to 125 grams per liter while white can start from 20 grams for Extra Dry and go up to 150 grams for the very sweet / lágrima style. Increase the number of jumping jacks and all will be fine!

oscarquevedo wrote:Jay, actually in average is a little bit more than 70 or 80 grams. Red Port varies from 100g to 125 grams per liter while white can start from 20 grams for Extra Dry and go up to 150 grams for the very sweet / lágrima style. Increase the number of jumping jacks and all will be fine!

Yikes! Well that's completely different than all of the information floating around on the internet!

We may have to bring Jay a treadmill to use between flights.

Glenn E. wrote:I'm aware that wine doesn't weigh exactly the same as pure water, but I think it's close enough for our purpose here.

Nearly all beer weighs in a little more than water, generally in the range 1.006 to 1.012 for most typical beers, 1.012 to 1.020 for some of the bigger ones. (Water would be 1.000.) Regular wine is generally lower, and can regularly be less dense than water (as alcohol is). I recall making a wine that was something like 0.997, and I would think 0.995 to 1.005 would be typical. Now Port and sweet wines are different. My guess, and this is just a guess, is that we are back in the 1.020 range.

Eric Menchen wrote:

Glenn E. wrote:I'm aware that wine doesn't weigh exactly the same as pure water, but I think it's close enough for our purpose here.

Nearly all beer weighs in a little more than water, generally in the range 1.006 to 1.012 for most typical beers, 1.012 to 1.020 for some of the bigger ones. (Water would be 1.000.) Regular wine is generally lower, and can regularly be less dense than water (as alcohol is). I recall making a wine that was something like 0.997, and I would think 0.995 to 1.005 would be typical. Now Port and sweet wines are different. My guess, and this is just a guess, is that we are back in the 1.020 range.

Didn't know about this, very good Eric! 1.0248 for our Quinta Vale d'Agodinho VIntage 2008 says IVDP's lab!

Many of the newer spec sheets from some producers show the residual sugar per liter. A check of Niepoort's 2009 VP shows 100.2 grams per liter.

Was looking around a bit and Noval's Black is "Residual Sugar 89,8 g/dm3"

Niepoort's 10 year old tawny is Residual Sugar 106,3 g/L.
The 30 year old is Residual Sugar 110,8 g/L

oscarquevedo wrote:

Eric Menchen wrote:

Glenn E. wrote:I'm aware that wine doesn't weigh exactly the same as pure water, but I think it's close enough for our purpose here.

Nearly all beer weighs in a little more than water, generally in the range 1.006 to 1.012 for most typical beers, 1.012 to 1.020 for some of the bigger ones. (Water would be 1.000.) Regular wine is generally lower, and can regularly be less dense than water (as alcohol is). I recall making a wine that was something like 0.997, and I would think 0.995 to 1.005 would be typical. Now Port and sweet wines are different. My guess, and this is just a guess, is that we are back in the 1.020 range.

Didn't know about this, very good Eric! 1.0248 for our Quinta Vale d'Agodinho VIntage 2008 says IVDP's lab!

Wow, impressive guess! Well done Eric!

Niepoort's website offers technical sheets with all their wines and ports, with is really convenient. You can read there that their 2009 Vintage Port contains 100,2g of sugar per liter.