1970 Graham

[Alex Bridgeman]

Having just returned from a 2 week holiday in the port desert that is Italy (very nice, thank you for asking) I decided to open something rather special to console myself over England's inability to play cricket at the Oval and to celebrate GB's success on Sunday in Rio.

Oporto bottled. Lovely deep tawny brown colour of mature port; 70% opaque. Delicious nose with tobacco and sweet lavender. On the palate this delivers sweet aniseed with lots of power. The mid-palate shows hints of tannins, lots of tobacco and redcurrant and immense amounts of red aniseed - really powerful and concentrated, very impressive. On the late palate the sweet flower fragrance suddenly shows up. The aftertaste has lots of icing sugar at first, then the aniseed takes over - sweet but very spicy. This is a great bottle of a superb port. At its peak but in no rush to drink. 94/100. Drunk 14-Aug-16. Decanted 2 hours.