Port doesn’t cultivate a trendy reputation. It conjures images of the old colonial British empire, and it’s not helping that the trade is mostly controlled by families and companies of British origin. But Port has still a lot going for itself, and in the last 20 years or so has been undergoing deep changes in its elaboration.
This week I want to discuss the various styles of Port, and what makes them distinctive.
The basics
Port is a fortified wine. This means that instead of fermenting the grapes until the sugar has been turned into alcohol, the winemaker stops the fermentation by adding grape spirits to the fermenting must. This leaves the final wine with a fairly high level of alcohol -usually between 18 and 22% abv- and lots of residual sugar -between 20g/l for drier styles to over 150g/l for the sweeter styles-
Fortification was done for very practical reasons, as it made the wine more stable for long sea voyages. Unlike many other wine growing places where wine is consumed locally, the city of Porto has long been a shipping hub and most Port is exported. But modern winemaking techniques have solved the problem of wine stability -at least for wine meant to be consumed young-, so now this is just done for stylistic reasons. Port is always aged before bottling and often blended from multiple vineyards and/or vintages.
Let’s explore what a winemaker can do to vary the style of Port they produce.
Alcohol and residual sugar
Unlike many other fortified wines -including Sherry-, the spirit added during fermentation can make up a significant chunk of the final alcohol level, up to 20%. This means that the nature of this spirit matters and the residual sugar can be really high. dumping large amounts of alcohol will prematurely end the fermentation and leave all the grape sugars in the final wine.
The last 20 years have seen a noticeable change towards less neutral spirits which taste more like wine rather than pure alcohol, but also an expansion in the range of available sweetnesses.
Grapes and colour
There are over 30 varieties of grapes allowed in Port winemaking. And most Port made is red. But winemakers can choose to use only white grapes and make White Port. More controversially use red grapes with a very short maceration time to make Rosé/Pink Port.
Both white and rosé port are usually made in dryer styles, meant to be drunk as a lighter apéritif, although there is a particular style of white port called Lagrima that is finished cloyingly sweet (usually above 150g/L of residual sugar).
Ageing
Most inexpensive Port is only aged for a couple of years and sold as Ruby port. Tawny port without indication of age looks brown like if it was aged, but this is achieved by either blending white wine, or heavy fining or even sometimes hot maturation. It doesn’t develop the nutty characteristics of aged Tawny.
Reserva (or Reserve) wines have to be aged for a few years and they offer a more complex expression of those basic Ruby or Tawny ports.
Barrels
The big divide in port styles is how much oxygen the port is in contact with as it ages. When aged in very large barrels, the wine is in contact with very little oxygen, which preserves its fresh fruit characters. When aged in small barriques, the oxygen turns these flavours into dried fruits/nuts notes. ReserveTawny ports have to be aged 6 years or more, while Tawny with an age indication (10, 20 years or more)
Single vintage vs multi-vintage
Like in Champagne, there is a long-standing tradition of blending wines from multiple years to achieve the style of the house. Producers only make port from a single vintage if it is very good, which tends to happen every 3 or 4 years on average. They will be labelled Vintage port or Late Bottled Vintage (LBV) port (discussed below).
With its level of alcohol and sugar, Port ages for a very long time. So if you see a 10, 20, 30 or 40 year old Tawny port on the label, it will be made with a blend of several years. While the anchor wine will be of that age, and the overall taste profile will be consistent with it, some much younger and older wines will be used to make it. A Colheita is a single vintage Tawny Port.
Early vs late bottling
Another factor at play is when the wine was bottled. While Port is aged in barrels for at least a couple of years, what happens next is the winemaker’s choice. Early bottling means that the sediment from tannins will deposit in the bottle as it ages, but it will preserve the fresh fruit aromas. This is how VintagePort is made and it benefits from bottle ageing.
With a late bottling, there will be a bit more oxidation, but the sediment will fall in the barrel rather than in the bottle and can be even filtered out. This is the domain of Late Bottled VintagePort, which in style is similar to a high-quality Ruby Reserve, and can be drunk soon after release. There is a small production of UnfilteredLBVPort which is more similar in style to Vintage and benefits from bottle ageing.
Single vineyard vs multiple vineyards
Single vineyard (called ‘Quinta’) Ports are quite rare although a growing segment. Since they are usually made from the best vineyard from a producer, they can make a single vintage port almost every year. For that reason, they are usually not as prestigious as a vintage port.
Blending it all together
All of this seems complicated, but the good news is that from the label you can tell what you are buying:
If you want to taste some excellent ports without breaking the bank, LBV ports are a good middle ground where you get a hint of what a great vintage port tastes like, but you can drink it now and they are usually reasonably priced.
Until next week, happy drinking!