NV DR Lo 70 Agri Roncao

[winesecretary]

There is a level of high fidelity music reproduction where whether or not the equipment is reproducing the music well is no longer the point. The point is whether the way in which that particular series of extremely expensive bits of high fidelity music equipment are reproducing it is a way that ticks all your particular boxes, while recognising that other people’s boxes may be ticked by a different combination of extremely expensive boxes.

This port has me in a somewhat similar situation.

An extremely generous gift from an American forumite, here I am contemplating the last glass after a couple of months of trying it, sharing it with others and asking their opinion and considering it again.

A deep red-brown with an amber rim shot with green.

A wine of remarkable viscosity, tending towards the engine oil of pedro ximenez.

The nose has nuts, dried cherries, some rancio, some plump sultanas and a little orange oil.

Very smooth and sweet on entry, with the sweetness overpowering the fruit altogether until the Melton Hunt Cake mid-palate. (The many separate ingredients thereof are interestingly separately delineated, including the margarine.)

The congruent finish lasts a good minute, with a bit of prune, late.

It is remarkable fortified wine, and a very good one. It’s been a privilege to be able to consider and reconsider it. But, I have concluded that it’s not really my preferred hi fi equipment.

[Glenn E.]

There is a level of high fidelity music reproduction where whether or not the equipment is reproducing the music well is no longer the point. The point is whether the way in which that particular series of extremely expensive bits of high fidelity music equipment are reproducing it is a way that ticks all your particular boxes, while recognising that other people’s boxes may be ticked by a different combination of extremely expensive boxes.

What a wonderful explanation! Evocative and clear at the same time.

I wonder, then, which boxes are left unchecked for you. I ask because there are boxes it leaves unchecked for me as well, though in my case the result is still that it is among my most preferred hi-fi equipment.

[winesecretary]

I think for me it is missing what I think of as a ‘port-ness’ in the way that the very best Colheitas, for example the 1896 Krohn, retain it. It renders the timbre of the cello differently.

I suppose I am looking for a red fruit note which (very reasonably) you may say I am unlikely to find in a really old tawny such as this.

[winesecretary]

To put it another way - I prefer ribbon tweeters, but I find electrostatics lacking in the bass. It doesn’t mean I wouldn’t want some stacked Quad ESL 57s in the third listening room.

[Glenn E.]

As odd as this may sound, for me it lacks power. It is too smooth and too balanced. It is refined and elegant, and I would prefer something slightly more deep. The timbre of the cello, yes.

Compared to some other top-1% Ports, I also find its sweetness to be rather... uninteresting. It's palm sugar where it could have been crystalized honey, or brown sugar, or demerara/turbinado sugar.