- The port index is made up of the 1945, 1955, 1960, 1963 and 1970 wines shipped by the ten leading firms in Oporto. These are Cockburn, Croft, Dow, Fonseca, Graham, Martinez, Quinta do Noval, Sandeman, Taylor and Warre. Britain took the largest quantity of these wines, though small shipments were made to most Western countries.
In the United States some liquor stores keep vintage port for the benefit of customers who knows what’s what, but it can be hard to find. For in some parts of the United States port is still thought of as a wino’s drink — a cut above methylated spirits perhaps, but a drink with an unsavoury image all the same. …
The trade has seen consumption in Britain fall from 50 million litres in the 1920s (and from 28 million in the 1793 sic), to just 7 million today. Fortunately the French market has taken up the slack. Exports to France last year reached 23 million litres — nearly double the figure since 1975. Most of this is drunk as an apéritif and treated much like Dubonnet, Vermouth, and so on. A good deal gets used in the kitchen. Surprisingly, the French show no interest in vintage port. The 1984 import figure was 12,000 litres, a total that could be explained by a single order from the British Embassy in Paris.
Library tidying
Library tidying
More tidying and pruning of books. Going to the great white library in the sky is The Successful Investor, 1986, by Robin Duthy. It contains a chapter on wine, and a sub-section on port.