Niepoort Complete

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Axel P
Taylor Quinta de Vargellas 1987
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Niepoort Complete

Post by Axel P »

Well it started out to be the first try to do a Vintage Port tasting in Germany.

Since Niepoort did declare quite a lot over the decades I was down to 1963 for the first part last year, as it turned out to be and invited Dirk to join as well.

Well, Dirk arrived and we had:

2007 Pisca Cask sample
2005
2003
2000
1997
1994
1992
1991
1987
1985
1983
1982
1980
1978
1977
1970
1963

Dirk brought a 1863 Colheita for Dinner and promised that there was a second part of this tasting with his elder ports. He supported this second tasting with a lot of ancient bottles from his cellar and we had:

2008 Pisca cask sample
2007 Pisca
1985, 3 bottles of which all were crabby
1977 Garafeira
1975
1970 Colheita, Vintage Port out of the bulky and normal bottle
1966 Colheita and Vintage Port
1964 Garafeira
1963
1960
1955
1948 Garafeira
1945
1942 out of a litre bottle
1927

Having attended these two very special tasting I do think I have a rough idea of what a Niepoort port is like :-)

Summary: A brilliant line of declarations. Yes 75 is pale, but still enjoyable, the 63 is not really a blockbuster, but you do not really find a weak spot in the line, except that the 85 is widely infected. To my statistics 1 out of 6 bottles is good, which makes it rather expensive. However the 45 is the best 45 on the market (of the ones that I have tasted so far), 27 is full alive, 55 is brilliant. 66 and 70 are definitely price/value winners (if you can get hold on these).

I try to summ up the TNs soon, but here are some pics:
Alle zusammen 2009.JPG
Alle zusammen 2009.JPG (43.65 KiB) Viewed 9966 times
and one more down there:

Axel
Last edited by Axel P on 18:37 Sun 21 Nov 2010, edited 1 time in total.
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Axel P
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Re: Niepoort Complete

Post by Axel P »

Alle zusammen 2010.jpg
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JacobH
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Re: Niepoort Complete

Post by JacobH »

Sounds like a fun time :-)

What are your thoughts on the normal v. ‟dumpy” bottles of the 1970?
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DRT
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Re: Niepoort Complete

Post by DRT »

That is a truely spectacular line-up of Ports. Cudos to Dirk for digging those old bottles out of the cellar 88)

I look forward to reading some TN's and am kicking myself very hard for not seizing the opportunity to be there :evil:
"The first duty of Port is to be red"
Ernest H. Cockburn
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Axel P
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Re: Niepoort Complete

Post by Axel P »

Jacob,

this is a tricky one, since everybody believes the dumpy bottles to be better than the straight ones. I managed to acquire straight ones from 1970 which were stored in a rather cool place for many years and these were absolutely spectacular. I do believe though if stored alike, that the bulky bottles are for whatever reason better.

Maybe we should collect some and ask someone to fill a young Vp into them, let them age for 20 some years and compare them later on.

Best

Axel
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jdaw1
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Re: Niepoort Complete

Post by jdaw1 »

A splendidly arranged evening. Axel had a team of elves decanting and pouring and carrying and fetching, and into glasses that were uniformly clean. Leverkusen is a corporate town, and the Bayer Gastronomie (the clue is in the name) knows how to make glasses clean. I approve. Thank you Axel.

The old Niepoorts were so young. By a huge margin the youngest 1927 I have tasted (though chronologically the oldest), and perhaps the same true of the 1945. Deeply impressive.
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Axel P
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Re: Niepoort Complete

Post by Axel P »

Julian,

thanks for your kind words. Since many of the elves trained hard in the UK they already knew what to do.

For all: If Julian approves the tidyness of the glasses, we all know what that means!!!

Axel
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Re: Niepoort Complete

Post by albertuswijnen »

Fantastic line-up. Must be great to taste several vintages with Dirk. I had the '85 Niepoort some months ago. It was my only bottle, so very scary if it was ok.. lucky it was. Still very young. Not as fantastic as other vintages I tasted.
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