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• Review of the evening as a whole;
• Planning and arrangements;
• Placemats;
• Tasting notes:
  • 1873 Schofield;
  • 1896 Elviro Garcia ‘Refreshed’ tawny;
  • 1932 Butler Nephew;
  • 1938 Hooper;
  • 1942 Hooper;
  • 1944 Hooper colheita;
  • 1947 Barros colheita;
  • 1952 Barros colheita;
  • Infantado Vintage Character, bottled October 1996.

Decanted 3pm.

Look: Lightly cloudy. Light brown tint, but not what I'd call tan. Still red though.

Nose: Sourish, also some VA. Freshly dried apricots.

Taste: Very briefly sour on first contact, then very nice. Swallow and it's gone, though - it just vanishes.

Finish: Virtually none, though by the time I got to these it's possible I just couldn't detect a finish as my palate was overwhelmed.

I rated this #2 on the night despite the above notes. I found that as the night continued that most of the Ports didn't fare well compared directly to each other. Their flavors were often altered dramatically by whichever other Port I had just tried. The '47 and '52 Barros, however, were rock solid and seemed to improve as the night wore on. You wouldn't think that a Colheita would open up, but that's exactly what it seemed like they were doing to me. I'm not sure we even hit their sweet spot as we were only at the restaurant for 4 hours.

I took the remainder of this bottle back to the apartment to share with my brother-in-law, his wife, and my wife the next evening. By then they seemed to have been open too long, though they were still excellent and everyone enjoyed their samples.