2022: December 15 - The Port Forum's 15th Xmas Tasting

[Alex Bridgeman]

As has become our normal routine, we gathered together at the White Horse Inn in Newport, Essex to share some Port. The theme was the usual one of The Unknown Shipper and His Peculiar Friends. Tongs were used to open most of the bottles to give the best chance of identifying the bottles from the branded corks, the exception being the bottle of Shortridge & Laughton Moscatel that George opened some days in advance to allow the wine to breathe adequately before we consumed it.

The wines we tasted were:

1. Dow 1927 from CPR
2. Schofield 1922 from PW - the capsule was stamped "Schofield's 1922" and the cork branded "Vintage 1922", which is consistent with other Schofield bottles we have had in the past, so the shipper remains unknown — or perhaps this was a blended wine similar to Avery's Finest Reserve Vintage Ports
3. Unknown 1892 from WPS - french bottled in a bottle bearing a seal "Guillot Brasseur Feurs (Loire)"
4. Tuke Holdsworth 1922 from THRA - bottled by William Smith of Bishop's Stortford
5. Dow 1960 from IDJ
6. Croft, believed 1912 from AHB - the cork was branded although damaged. The shipper was reasonably clear, the vintage mostly obscured other than the last digit being "2". The vintage was deduced from the character and age of the bottle.
7. Feuerheerd 1896 from MPM - the bottler was embossed on the wax capsule, but very difficult to read. Perhaps it was "Walter Schladen Middlesborough"
8. Graham 1966 from AJM
9. Croft 1922 from AHB on behalf of OJMQ
10. Shortridge & Laughton Moscatel 1900 from GEAG
11. Warre 1970 from IDJ

Phil - if you get the chance to post some of your pictures from the evening, please do.

Link to the organisation thread.