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Thinking about my encounters with the Taylor VP blend, and the Vargellas SQVP, I can't help feeling a preference for the Vargellas signature over the blend.

When Taylor pass on a declaration in a good year but bottle Vargellas (e.g. 1978/1987/1991) - the result is superb.

I would love to see Taylor bottle this SQ in declared years as well as interim ones - maybe not as frequently as Vesuvio, but perhaps six or seven times a decade.

- What do others think?

Tom

I suppose the answer depends on how much of the Vargellas juice goes into the full vintage blend. It may be that there isn't enough left of a high enough quality to make a viable release of the SQVP in a declared year.

On the basic question, my answer would be yes, I'd like to see more of the SQVP as it is always excellent value.

Derek

Cant argue. But its not a cheap alternative, is it.

As much as I love Vargellas (I think it's my favorite SQ) I would hate to see it disappear from the regular Taylor's blend, as I think few things surpass a good Taylor's port. And I do think they need about all good grapes from Vargellas in the regular VP.

BTW, so far in this decade, Vargellas was produced in 2001, 2004 and 2005. If they proceed there will be a good chance they'll achieve the six or seven this decade.

Conky wrote:Cant argue. But its not a cheap alternative, is it.

It can be, I bought a 6 pack of the 1987 for less than £20 per bottle. The 87 is, I'm told, a truely great VP so at this price I consider it a steal. If you compare that with any declared Taylor's VP you will find a price gap of ast least £30 per bottle in almost every instance.

Derek

Tom will now step in and tell me he's just picked up a case of T63 for £50 in an auction just to blow my argument out the water

It may be that there isn't enough left of a high enough quality to make a viable release of the SQVP in a declared year

According to Liddell (1992) Vargellas has 167,000 vines producing 225 pipes, with 60% of the vines averaging 75 years old. Few other Quintas come anywhere near having so many old vines.

This would suggest that in a declared year, they should normally have more than enough wine for both the Taylor blend and an SQ

Tom

In that case, I'm with you on this.

However, I wonder if the logic behind them not doing this has more to do with marketing. If we take a stellar year, like 1994, would they have shifted all their blend VP at the same price they achieved if there had been a little brother SQVP at 1/3rd of the price as an alternative?

Derek

Most of the big names in Bordeaux run a second wine in addition to the primary brew - and usually very much cheaper - yet this does not seem to cause any marketing problems.

Noval produce Silval as a second wine with no obvious problems too.

It might be prudent (to avoid confusion) to re-design the Vargellas label so that the Taylor name is consigned to the small print, but aside from that, I can't see any difficulties, provided it IS presented as a second wine.

In 2000, they were accused of robbing the main brew of the best juice by running Vinha Velha in tandem - something they didn't repeat in '03.

Tom

This would suggest that in a declared year, they should normally have more than enough wine for both the Taylor blend and an SQ

You suggest here that all the grapes from Vargellas are good enough for VP; I doubt if that's the case. And even if all grapes are of a stellar quality, amounts of that would still be needed for other blends, like LBV and ruby reserve.