For The Love Of Port

Just wondering how drinkable 2000 VP's are now? It's seven years from the harvest and they should currently be in the "shut down" phase. Lately I have been tasting only a couple of bottles and they both have been closed (Dow, Warre) but what is vintage's status overall now?

I'm considering to buy some cases but this makes me hesitate because I also want to crack open some bottles..

-Antti-

Antti,

Generally speaking, I would say yes. I've had a few in the past 6 or so months and noticed some of them are starting to shut down.

Antti, I agree that they do seem a bit shut down and to my tastes have been so for about a year now. Fonseca and Warre are two that I most recently tried. They both showed that they are excellent Ports (Fonseca especially is a real beauty, but the Warre is much to my tastes also) - so they aren't as utterly shut down as, e.g. Bordeaux can be, but I wouldn't open them now. Though I might make an exception for a formal tasting.

Antti, Yes, I think the 2000 vintage is in a shut down phase. I opened a Fonseca 2000 not long ago and it was not giving much aromatically. After 24 hours in the decanter it started to open up but was still tight.

Mutual consensus seems to be that they are indeed close. Maybe I should focus to '94 vintage instead.. Thanks guys!

-Antti-

Antti,

Lots of the 1994's are still a few years or decades from showing their best and some may be "closed" - perhaps you should focus on lesser, earlier maturing, years like 91/92 or go back to the 80's - almost anything you find there will be ready now, assuming you have access to these in Finland.

Derek

I just open a 2000 fonseca vp and you guys are right. It just seem like it was sleeping and didn't want to wake up at all :?

Alex R,

How much decanter time do you give that Fonseca 2000? I'm going to take a wild stab and say you will likely need at least 14-18 hours, possibly 2 days before that baby opens up just a tad.

Alan, feel free to preach on about infanticide... I'm not sure I could have even sacrificed a Fonseca '00!

Todd

it was only a half bottle and it was in the decanter for over 12 hours.

Nevski wrote:Just wondering how drinkable 2000 VP's are now? It's seven years from the harvest and they should currently be in the "shut down" phase. Lately I have been tasting only a couple of bottles and they both have been closed (Dow, Warre) but what is vintage's status overall now?

I'm considering to buy some cases but this makes me hesitate because I also want to crack open some bottles..

-Antti-

I agree with the m=comments so far. They are mostly shut down at present.

They're passing trough the "Dark Phase" and i think most of them will be in this phase untill the 15 YO.


João Rico