ThePortForum.com

Does anyone know when the regulations changed to ban ruby reserve Port from being called Vintage Character? I have a bottle I'm trying to (roughly) date.

Thanks.

I have a bottle of Vintage Character from 1977.
I can also find images of Churchill’s Vintage Character port, which suggests the rule change was after 1982. When I get a chance I will look through some books later to see if I can find the date.

From the archive of www.infoportwine.com

"With Portaria no. 1484/2002 of November 22nd , 2002 a step was taken in the regulation of types and indications. The most important changes in this law were the replacement of the Vintage Character by the Reserva/Reserve (Ruby), the introduction of the Reserva Tawny/Tawny Reserve and the Reserva Branco/White Reserve and the demands for the Garrafeira."

Thanks, DRT!

I’m often surprised at how recent this change was, although I’m pretty sure I’ve seen El Vino’s “Vintage Character” for sale much more recently and I doubt that was reserve stocks (perhaps they were labeling it in the UK?).

I don't dispute DRT's post.

I am preserving, for posterity, a couple of good examples of VC.

The lesser styles of port do not survive the test of time. I have a half (and sadly empty) bottle of 'Invalid Port', but despite sales running into many millions, and from more than one producer, I have never been able to secure a full bottle in good order.

If anyone spots one, a safe home awaits!

uncle tom wrote: ↑22:15 Sun 27 Dec 2020The lesser styles of port do not survive the test of time. I have a half (and sadly empty) bottle of 'Invalid Port', but despite sales running into many millions, and from more than one producer, I have never been able to secure a full bottle in good order.

It’s interesting that there is little of this when there is a healthy secondary market for antique bottles of quite normal spirits (and many posh cocktail bars in London will happily sell you a £100 negroni containing 50-year-old gin, vermouth and campari). I suppose people were more likely to open the cheaper bottles of Port, only preserving the Vintage Ports (and sometimes the LBVs) for special occasions which might never come.

There’s a nice short article on Port to Port Wine about Vintage Character Port which includes a few photographs of old labels. I’d not come across one of the shippers: Hunt, Roope & Co. before. I am also interested that the Quinta do Infantado is described as “meio-seco”: “medium dry”. I wonder what that was like?