ThePortForum.com

We tasted 2003s, at the Boot & Flogger, on Tuesday 18th March 2025, as organised by Michael Charlton.

Links:

• Review of the evening as a whole;
• Tasting notes:
  1. 2003 Portal;
  2. 2003 Portal+;
  3. 2003 Niepoort;
  4. 2003 Niepoort Secundum = Fortnum & Mason;
  5. 2003 Kopke;
  6. 2003 Burmester;
  7. 2003 Cálem;
  8. 2003 Sandeman Vau;
  9. 2003 Quinta do Noval;
  10. 2003 Tesco;
  11. 2003 Sainsbury’s Taste The Difference;
  12. 2003 Cockburn;
  13. 2003 Quinta de Roriz;
  14. 2003 Gould Campbell;
  15. 2003 Warre;
  16. 2003 Dow;
  17. 2003 Graham;
  18. 2003 Quinta do Vesuvio;
  19. 2003 Fonseca;
  20. 2003 Taylor;
  21. 2003 Croft;
  22. 2003 Krohn;
• Placemats;
• Food order;
• Planning and organisation.

Folks,

Many thanks indeed for coming along to tonight’s tasting. I thought it was very instructive, somewhat surprising (score sheet below, input re my maths appreciated as may be needed), and my thanks to you all for your patience with respect to my attempts at organisation.

Turning now to the all-important scoresheet, the scores were:

1) W (20 points);
2) Cá (14 points);
3) V (12 points);
4) G (10 points);
5) GC (5 points);
5) F (5 points); and also in fifth place
5) Cr (5 points).

Who won the head-to-head competitions?

Pt+>Pt;
NiS>Ni; and
TTD>Ts (unanimity).

Scoresheet:

In summary, I thought that many Ports were of equally good quality, with a few shining through to attract points (per scoresheet). There were no Ports which I thought unimpressive, other than the (certainly faulty) D and the unfortunately closed T.

Many thanks to Michael for landing this one. Not often we do 22 ports in one sitting!

My main conclusion is come back again in 10 years. The ports had remarkable consistency - plenty of bramble fruit...gentle, or at times slightly more coarse tannin...good balance, structure passable but certainly not firm upright ports. The Warre and the Calem stood out, having a little more heft to them than the rest of the field.

Many of the ports offered pleasant drinking. That said, if I had a glass of Warre 04 LBV alongside these 22, it would have been indistinguishable. Which isn't a huge compliment. Overall the 2003s just didn't have a huge amount of character.

Turning to a comparison of the 2003s against the 2000s tasted last month. The two vintages are distinctly different. The 2000s are dry. The 2003s sweet, often jammy. Both vintages will improve from here, and the usual top shippers will likely pull away from the pack. Not clear that either vintage will get ahead of 1997, which is behind 1994 in my book.

My thanks to Michael for organising the evening, and everyone for their efforts in setup. It was good to do this tasting, in part because the results did not meet (at least my( expectations; the tasting was thus in all honesty more informative rather than being a fabulous tasting. The ports varied, with one definitely faulty (Dow - full of TCA), and perhaps a second (the Krohn certainly tasted pretty odd after a while; the Portal tasted odd from the start); Most were pleasant, but there were no rock stars; for me the Warre was a clear winner, with Calem and Vesuvio just behind, and others not far behind them. The Fonseca did not have the fresh bright vibrancy I had experienced with that wine previously, though it still had good flavour.
It was notable that there was little passion for mine sweeping, which I think summarised the overall feeling.

Many thanks to Michael for organising this one.

I was reflecting on this tasting on the way home and I can't believe I'm going to say this but I think that 22 ports in one evening tasting is too many, there seems to be a lot of wasted port.

my views on the 2003, there was a lot of very similar ports, a lot rich fruits, generally the tannin had softened, some seemed to be balanced others not, all of the of normal big guns seemed closed to me. I just couldn't get excited by any of these, there was nothing i wanted to sit and drink a bottle of. They need 10 more years before I can really judge them.

Overall I think that the 2000 and 2003 are going to be like the vintages in the 1980's. I'm not sure I would rush to buy any of the ports in these vintages on their current showing.

Screenshotted to retain as evidence in the future

flash_uk wrote: ↑13:11 Wed 19 Mar 2025 Screenshotted to retain as evidence in the future



harry_highlighted.jpg

Clearly, Harry's account has been hacked.

That is a truly impressive photo of the glasses!

There were in fact 24 ports. Harry and Neil have drawn a veil over the pre-tasting of 1958 TV and 1960 T.

Many thanks to Michael for organising - a tremendous effort.

This tasting was as comprehensive a survey of the 2003 vintage as anyone is ever likely to do or as I would ever want to do. These are young and fruity and most of them were good and will develop well. (I had the NiS down a a bit off as well as the Krohn and the Dow, but the assembled tasters disagreed on that one.) But they were a bit less fun to drink than the 2000s and indeed I drank less of them. I agree- mainly, come back in 10 years.

I’m with the consensus: many similar jammy black-fruited Ports, but lacking, for want of a better word, ‘interest’. More time needed.

Early on, I remember 2003s being huge, tannic, fruity beasts.

Is this perhaps a case of them still being in their "teenage funk" since they are only 22 years old?

I've long thought that there's no need to check on VP at ~20 years old, and that even 25 years old is still too early for a generally declared year. I grant that my experience only began in the mid-2000s so is limited to vintages like 1991/92 onward, but it has seemed to hold true so far.

Many thanks to Michael for organising , world class admin.

Very different to 2000 much more jammy an attribute right from the beginning in this hot vintage. I personally think these will have a longer life than the 2000 vintage and have much more potential.
I think alot of them are closed and way too early to drink. I did not find anything I would like to buy more of at he moment.
Come back in 15 + years.

I think I left my tasting notes there so if anyone picked them up do hand them over when next we meet.