ThePortForum.com

Dear all,

it was with an immense pleasure that the Wine Spectator Magazine just gave 100 points to the Dow's Vintage 2007 Port.

It is the 8th port wine to have this kind of honour, and it is the 1st Port from the 21st Century to get this kind of ponctuation.

I'm lucky to say that I have 6 bottles of this amazing wine!

Cheers!

Congratulations Raul! Here in the US 100pts from Suckling will be well received by port lovers, and it is nice to see a Symington property get that kind of recognition.

Speaking of port, my wife and I may be in Oporto in early August. Would you like to have a drink or two with us if we drive down from Galicia for the day or evening? Feel free to send me an offline message if you are available. Cheers, Bill

One of the most important sources for portwine in Germany already increased from 68 EUR to 98 EUR within 3 days.

That's insane, which store is that?
I was happy to get mine at 60 euro.

It's the only match you receive for Germany via winesearcher. Just the rules of market I'd say.
What me made angry was a call from a austrian shop I received today. I ordered 3 bottles of that Dow yesterday. A short while ago an employee told me that it is no more allowed to ship portwine from Austria to Germany for reason of customs. What cheek!
BTW: The dealer can be found via winesearcher. It's the only match you receive for Austria if you are looking for that Dow.

I was happy to get some @ 67,50 EUR or rather 65,00 EUR.

Just ordered 2 as well for 60,50EUR per bottle at http://www.tonovermars.nl before I have to pay the "german" prices

Dries, just a question of time I would suppose.

Now the second important German dealer increased from 65 EUR to 90 EUR.

It was an amazing news for us, that work in the Symington Family Estates but also for all the community that love port wine.
As a Portuguese, i'm also proud that a portuguese wine got recognized worldwide!
Cheers!

BTW: It should have been Number 9 (not Downing Street).

Pretty illustrious neighbourhood.

1927 Fonseca Vintage Port
1948 Fonseca Vintage Port
1977 Fonseca Vintage Port
1994 Fonseca Vintage Port
1963 Quinta do Noval Vintage Port Nacional
1931 Quinta do Noval Vintage Port Nacional
1994 Quinta do Noval Vintage Port Nacional
1994Taylor Fladgate Vintage Port

Anyone with a case of 1931 Nacional willing to have a case of 2007 Dow?

I just got access to the latest review on the 2007 Vintage Port that is going to be released on the Wine Spectator in May:
Dow's 2007 - 100 points;
Quinta do Vesuvio Vtg Port A Capela - 99 points;
Taylor's Quinta de Vargellas Vinhas Velhas - 97 Points;
Graham's 96 points;
Taylor's - 96 Points;
Niepoort - 95 Points;
Warre - 95 Points;
Fonseca - 94 Points;
Quinta do Vesuvio - 94 Points!
Quinta do Noval - 93 Points;
It is amazing, and taking the chance of beeing buyest, having 2 Vintage Ports in the first 2 places, and 3 ports in the TOP 5 is the proof that the symington's are doing a great job in winemaking! Congratulations to the Symington's and to the Portuguese Wine Industry!
But the greatest thing, is that Port wine, specially vintage port is getting his deserved recognition all around the world!

Cheers!

Interesting the noval is ranked lower considering fellow tpf's felt it was one of the best wines/

Nothing but big names on the list, and all the usual suspects at the top. I smell label bias.

Nothing but big names on the list, and all the usual suspects at the top. I smell label bias.

Compared with Roy's appraisal, which was comprehensive, thorough and strictly blind, it is not hard to draw that conclusion; unless, of course, these were the only wines they tried..

I find it hard to set aside the events of 18 months ago, when the WS was tricked into giving an Award of Excellence to a restaurant that didn't exist, in the process demonstrating that they were more interested in making money than in providing accurate information.

It is possible that they appraised the 2007 vintage ports in a manner that was every bit as professional as Roy's, but in the light of that scandal, I am disinclined to accord much credence to their pronouncements.

Tom

uncle tom wrote:

Nothing but big names on the list, and all the usual suspects at the top. I smell label bias.

Compared with Roy's appraisal, which was comprehensive, thorough and strictly blind, it is not hard to draw that conclusion; unless, of course, these were the only wines they tried..

I find it hard to set aside the events of 18 months ago, when the WS was tricked into giving an Award of Excellence to a restaurant that didn't exist, in the process demonstrating that they were more interested in making money than in providing accurate information.

It is possible that they appraised the 2007 vintage ports in a manner that was every bit as professional as Roy's, but in the light of that scandal, I am disinclined to accord much credence to their pronouncements.

Tom

I don't buy these negative theories of the both of you. I've been following Suckling's tasting notes for some 10 years now and find them thoroughly reliable. According to the WS website their tastings are blind, and I have no reason to doubt that. These scores are, therefore, the result of Suckling's blind assessment of a large number of 2007 vintage ports, and I trust his judgment.

For those interested and in the possession of a WS-online subscription, all scores and notes can now be found on the WS website.

RonnieRoots wrote: I don't buy these negative theories of the both of you. I've been following Suckling's tasting notes for some 10 years now and find them thoroughly reliable. According to the WS website their tastings are blind, and I have no reason to doubt that. These scores are, therefore, the result of Suckling's blind assessment of a large number of 2007 vintage ports, and I trust his judgment.

Very well said. What reasons for Suckling to consider anything or anyone? He should be by far the most respected journo when it comes to Port and thus absolutely independent. That's by the way his asset.

He should be by far the most respected journo when it comes to Port

I would suggest that Michael Broadbent's track record is superior when it comes to tasting young VP's and predicting their future prospect. Sadly, he appears to have now retired.

Whilst I hate to inflate his ego too much, I am impressed by Roy Hersh's recent work. He has clearly been working hard to hone his analytical skills when it comes to young VP, and has also evolved his own style of presentation; one that is both modest and informative.

However, it will be another twenty years before we know whether his forecast is correct or not..!

Tom

That Uncle Tom fella seems to know a thing or two also and seems to put his money where his mouth is and I apparently spied a case of 07 noval eh?

I apparently spied a case of 07 noval

Two cases in fact..

uncle tom wrote:I would suggest that Michael Broadbent's track record is superior when it comes to tasting young VP's and predicting their future prospect. Sadly, he appears to have now retired.

Broadbent also gets bonus points for not using these silly point scales...

Just try to find someone with a decent price and some stock...! Listing some £40-£50 a bottle but not in stock.

RonnieRoots wrote:

uncle tom wrote:

Nothing but big names on the list, and all the usual suspects at the top. I smell label bias.

Compared with Roy's appraisal, which was comprehensive, thorough and strictly blind, it is not hard to draw that conclusion; unless, of course, these were the only wines they tried..

I find it hard to set aside the events of 18 months ago, when the WS was tricked into giving an Award of Excellence to a restaurant that didn't exist, in the process demonstrating that they were more interested in making money than in providing accurate information.

It is possible that they appraised the 2007 vintage ports in a manner that was every bit as professional as Roy's, but in the light of that scandal, I am disinclined to accord much credence to their pronouncements.

Tom

I don't buy these negative theories of the both of you. I've been following Suckling's tasting notes for some 10 years now and find them thoroughly reliable. According to the WS website their tastings are blind, and I have no reason to doubt that. These scores are, therefore, the result of Suckling's blind assessment of a large number of 2007 vintage ports, and I trust his judgment.

I normally trust his ratings as well, but this particular set has me very ... suspicious.

This is the second set of scores that I've seen for these wines, and some of them have moved up markedly since his first blind tasting in Portugal. While it is absolutely possible that the Ports in question have improved somewhat during the intervening time (as I recall the original tasting was done at least partially from cask samples), I do not believe that any of them could have improved the 3-5 points that some of them have according to these new ratings. It is also possible that others have chimed in and added their impressions to JS's original scores in order to arrive at these final ratings for WS... I don't know for sure how they've labeled them as I haven't seen the full article. Even so, one would expect that JS's scores would hold more weight in the final ratings than the scores of others at WS, so again I don't see how some of the Ports could have moved as much as they have.

Is this the top 10 listed here? I don't have a WS subscription so I can't review the entire list on my own.

Glenn E. wrote:This is the second set of scores that I've seen for these wines, and some of them have moved up markedly since his first blind tasting in Portugal. While it is absolutely possible that the Ports in question have improved somewhat during the intervening time (as I recall the original tasting was done at least partially from cask samples), I do not believe that any of them could have improved the 3-5 points that some of them have according to these new ratings.

I do think these very young VPs can change a lot in a short period of time; my view of the Vesuvio Capela changed from thinking it was good but unexciting to extremely good between the 13th November 2009 and the 22nd February 2010. I have no idea how these points systems work, so I can’t say if it was 3-5 points’ worth of change, but it was a substantial and notable change. That said, I can see an argument that a professional reviewer should be more attuned to how the cask samples can change...

Given the listing earlier in the thread, it was impossible to ignore that all VPs mentioned, came from 3 companies. There are lots of fine Ports in that list in 2007, but there are others that deserve to be there too.

As a comparative exercise and learning experience, I enjoyed seeing the WS scores today and putting the scores next to my own. It made me remember which of the 2007's stood out from the crowd.

raul_alex wrote:Dow's 2007 - 100 points;
Quinta do Vesuvio Vtg Port A Capela - 99 points;
Taylor's Quinta de Vargellas Vinhas Velhas - 97 Points;
Graham's 96 points;
Taylor's - 96 Points;
Niepoort - 95 Points;
Warre - 95 Points;
Fonseca - 94 Points;
Quinta do Vesuvio - 94 Points!
Quinta do Noval - 93 Points;

Roy Hersh wrote:Given the listing earlier in the thread, it was impossible to ignore that all VPs mentioned, came from 3 companies.

Symingtons; Taylor-Fladgate Partnership; and the new secret alliance about which Roy was sworn to secrecy, Noval-Niepoort.

I must say that I'm not quite sure about the Dow score. Is it a good wine? Of course! Is it an outstanding wine? Sure! But is it a 100 point wine.....????? I too believe that there are a number of wines that have been overlooked that were not produced by the above mentioned three producers.

Marc