ThePortForum.com

Date: Wednesday 8th February 2012.
Theme: Bring a Blind Bottle to Share.
Location: The Bunghole, 57 High Holborn WC1V 6DT, ☎ 020 7831 8365.

People:

1. AHB;
2. JDAW;
3. RAYC;
4. PW;
5. DRT.

Tentatives include

• JGH.

I have chosen two bottles to bring to the next blind tasting in London. Has the date of that tasting yet been agreed?

I was wondering when someone (and who) would crack!

I am a tentative "in" for any date over next few weeks save for 25th Jan. Work may necessitate a last minute withdrawal, though in the case of a themed tasting my bottle could still attend.

I can’t make next Tue 24th Jan, nor Wed 1st Feb, nor Thu 2nd Feb.

RAYC can’t make Wed 25th Jan.

I'm in London on Wednesday 8th Feb and Wednesday 22nd Feb and have a couple of themes I'd like to suggest.

How about:
8th Feb - a small Churchill vertical. I have 1982, 1985, 1991 and 1984 Crusted and I'm happy to supply any and all on an adoption or swaps basis.

22nd Feb - a Jubilee Celebration. Bring a bottle that is somehow connected to the Royal Family or a Jubilee, no matter how tenuous the connection.

Both at the Bunghole.

AHB wrote:22nd Feb - a Jubilee Celebration. Bring a bottle that is somehow connected to the Royal Family or a Jubilee, no matter how tenuous the connection.

Does that mean that a bottle of Cruz Tawny sold to me by a Morrison's check-out assistant who was born in 1977 would qualify?

DRT wrote:

AHB wrote:22nd Feb - a Jubilee Celebration. Bring a bottle that is somehow connected to the Royal Family or a Jubilee, no matter how tenuous the connection.

Does that mean that a bottle of Cruz Tawny sold to me by a Morrison's check-out assistant who was born in 1977 would qualify?

Yes it would certainly fit the theme; but then you have to consider whether you would want to be allowed to attend future offlines when deciding what to bring.

Hi,

I cannot come to the 8th of February gathering since I will be away for business. 22nd of February does look better. Churchill vertical is a good idea. Have still 82 Churchill vintage normal bts and one or two 1995 Agua Alta Magnums.

regards

WS1

WS1 wrote:Hi,

I cannot come to the 8th of February gathering since I will be away for business. 22nd of February does look better. Churchill vertical is a good idea. Have still 82 Churchill vintage normal bts and one or two 1995 Agua Alta Magnums.

regards

WS1

CMAG has said that he is only able to make the 22nd and has requested that the 22nd be used as the date for the Jubilee Celebration offline.

Keen as always, though my availability might mean that I will not be able to confirm until closer to the time; I understand that this could mean that I might not get a place if a tasting turns out to be very popular.

With regards to the Jubilee tasting, a number of years ago at a Christmas tasting we had one of those ceramic decanters from Sandeman filled with a 1977 Silver Jubilee ‟Partners’ Port”; I wonder if we could find another?

It'd be a pity if i missed this tasting, as I have a bottle commemorating the Investiture of the Prince of Wales (1969).

I can't really think of any other excuse to open the damn thing (which I'm sure by this point will taste quite rubbish).

Hope you've all been keeping well --- I can't believe I haven't yet found a sufficient excuse to get over there and pop some bottles!

Chris Doty wrote:It'd be a pity if i missed this tasting, as I have a bottle commemorating the Investiture of the Prince of Wales (1969).

I can't really think of any other excuse to open the damn thing (which I'm sure by this point will taste quite rubbish).

We had one last year (or was it the year before?) and it was OK. It was probably never a blockbuster, but it was a nice mature port that drank reasaonably well. Don't give up on it.

AHB wrote:

Chris Doty wrote:It'd be a pity if i missed this tasting, as I have a bottle commemorating the Investiture of the Prince of Wales (1969).

I can't really think of any other excuse to open the damn thing (which I'm sure by this point will taste quite rubbish).

We had one last year (or was it the year before?) and it was OK. It was probably never a blockbuster, but it was a nice mature port that drank reasaonably well. Don't give up on it.

I seem to remember it being more than just "OK"! TN here. And Dirk N was rather intrigued by this one, if i remember correctly. I would buy again if i saw.

AHB wrote:

Chris Doty wrote:It'd be a pity if i missed this tasting, as I have a bottle commemorating the Investiture of the Prince of Wales (1969).

I can't really think of any other excuse to open the damn thing (which I'm sure by this point will taste quite rubbish).

We had one last year (or was it the year before?) and it was OK. It was probably never a blockbuster, but it was a nice mature port that drank reasaonably well. Don't give up on it.

I thought it was pretty nice, and didn’t you give it more points than a 1955 Taylor and 1947 Smith Woodhouse?

RAYC wrote:I seem to remember it being more than just "OK"! TN here. And Dirk N was rather intrigued by this one, if i remember correctly. I would buy again if i saw.

Of course AHB may just have higher standards for what constitutes a ‟nice mature Port”...

AHB wrote:I'm in London on Wednesday 8th Feb and Wednesday 22nd Feb and have a couple of themes I'd like to suggest.

How about:
8th Feb - a small Churchill vertical. I have 1982, 1985, 1991 and 1984 Crusted and I'm happy to supply any and all on an adoption or swaps basis.

22nd Feb - a Jubilee Celebration. Bring a bottle that is somehow connected to the Royal Family or a Jubilee, no matter how tenuous the connection.

Both at the Bunghole.

I would love to do Churchill, but i think it would be nice to do the Churchill with Wolfgang, who confessed to me the other day that he had never had a Ch85 (at least i think it was him).

However if CMAG wants the Jubilee on 22nd (and he did get in first), perhaps we save the Churchill for another casual offline in March/April.

Please pencil me in for both Feb dates in any event. My suggestion for 8th would either be a simple "bring a bottle blind" or we could see who signs up and send a few PMs amongst us to determine what we want to drink.

RAYC wrote:I would love to do Churchill, but i think it would be nice to do the Churchill with Wolfgang, who confessed to me the other day that he had never had a Ch85 (at least i think it was him).

For what it’s worth, although I only think I have a couple of Churchills, if we can get enough bottles together, I do think it would be nice to do a ‟proper” Churchill vertical at some stage, before the number of declared vintages makes it infeasible. It’s one of very few shippers where a full house might not be too difficult or expensive to arrange.

I'm not wedded to the two themes by any means. I'm happy to change the theme for the 8th to our frequent Bring a Blind Bottle to Share and defer the Churchill tasting to another time.

If the date can be firmed up I am sure I will be able to attend...I like the idea of a Churchill mini vertical, although I have none, but would be happy to adopt if possible.

Cookie wrote:If the date can be firmed up I am sure I will be able to attend...

Both dates have been firmed in my diary already!

Cookie wrote:I like the idea of a Churchill mini vertical

I think the Churchill mini-vertical is potentially to be postponed, leaving a blind bottle tasting on 8th and Jubilee-themed dasting on 22nd.

Title and first post of this thread updated such that its subject is now the blind tasting Web 8 Feb 2012.

Tasting to be held two weeks later to continue in new thread, Wed 22nd Feb 2012, Jubilee.

We need to agree a location. The new obvious?

Cookie wrote:If the date can be firmed up I am sure I will be able to attend...I like the idea of a Churchill mini vertical, although I have none, but would be happy to adopt if possible.

Both dates are firm, so please state as and when you know you are able to attend.

On the thread discussing the offline on Feb 22, I suggested for the moment we use both TCP and TBH due to the convenience of TCP for some of us when we need to head home and the convenience of TBH for others. I suggest we use TBH for this event on Feb 8.

The Churchill theme will be deferred to a later date as Wolfgang would like to attend the Churchill offline but can't make this date. Therefore the theme shall be our reliable "Bring a blind bottle of port to share with fellow port lovers" and we can all attempt not to humiliate ourselves. If there are only a small number of people attending, I might even bring my black tasting glasses and see if anyone is able to do better than DRT's perfectly reasonable but spectacularly wrong last attempt.

First post updated:

jdaw1 wrote:Location: The Bunghole, 57 High Holborn WC1V 6DT, ☎ 020 7831 8365.

When I’ve counted the likely attendees then I’ll book.

I hope to be able to join you on the 8th; please count me in.

First post updated to say

jdaw1 wrote:People:

1. AHB;
2. JDAW;
3. RAYC;
4. PW.

Tentatives include

• JGH.

I’ll book next week, when the number of people might be better known.

As 31 Jan required booking at The Bunghole, Wed 8 Feb provisionally booked at the same time. Somebody should call (☎ 020 7831 8365) when the number of people is more accurately known.

I'm in.

First draft of the placemats.

Would it be entirely stupid to suggest that as a 'bonus' for this informal we could consider including the 'DRT Cocktail'? Obviously this would only work if everyone thought it was a good idea, since it would need all to pitch in for the ingredient to be viable, but I know that I for one would enjoy the opportunity at shared cost. Just a thought.

Whilst I do enjoy that cocktail, I think we have too few participants at this particular event to make it a reasnable cost. A good bottle would be anywhere between £300-500, so would perhaps be more practical when we have a few more mouths and wallets in play.

DRT wrote:Whilst I do enjoy that cocktail, I think we have too few participants at this particular event to make it a reasnable cost. A good bottle would be anywhere between £300-500, so would perhaps be more practical when we have a few more mouths and wallets in play.

Fair enough. Personally I thought that the smaller group was the right size (if all liked the idea) as it would allow for a couple of glasses each of the (hopefully) awesome fluid per person; I guessed we would be looking at ~80/head to do it, which for me personally would be much more viable than planning to buy one at 400 sometime. Am perfectly happy that all of the small group attending this offline would have a veto on the idea; I therefore take this as DRT using his veto and so will drop the suggestion.

But of course, since this is a blind tasting, if someone wanted to bring a pre-mixed bottle of DRT's favourite cocktail then I'm sure we'd all be willing to try it. Sadly I can't oblige with one this year

Just to be clear, I haven't vetoed anything. I simply gave an opinion that I am more than happy for people to challenge.

hmmm...maybe someone should aim to bring some pseudo-Croft 45 instead!

RAYC wrote:hmmm...maybe someone should aim to bring some pseudo-Croft 45 instead!

Is it too much to hope that I will ever be forgiven for that? No, I thought not.

jdaw1 wrote:I have chosen two bottles to bring to the next blind tasting in London. Has the date of that tasting yet been agreed?

I have a pair of bottles. Please sir, may I bring two? (DRT knows all, so should neither guess nor gab.)

jdaw1 wrote:

jdaw1 wrote:I have chosen two bottles to bring to the next blind tasting in London. Has the date of that tasting yet been agreed?

I have a pair of bottles. Please sir, may I bring two?

{pause for a respectable amount of time} OK, I suppose we can let you do it this once

jdaw1 wrote:First draft of the placemats.

Who will print? I can do so tomorrow afternoon if there will be no later changes.

I can do so on Wednesday. Or even on Tuesday, to be left at TBH.

I will leave the printing for you.

Unfortunately, this time i have to be a genuine tentative. My week looks pretty horrible.

RAYC wrote:Unfortunately, this time i have to be a genuine tentative. My week looks pretty horrible.

I could meet you in Smithfield Market at 00:00 with some samples to wash down the bacon and egg rolls?

DRT wrote:

RAYC wrote:Unfortunately, this time i have to be a genuine tentative. My week looks pretty horrible.

I could meet you in Smithfield Market at 00:00 with some samples to wash down the bacon and egg rolls?

As a fall back, this would work well for me! Though "Plan A" is a pave rump with bernaise and new potatoes at 9.45.

Unfortunately, having been the one who set up tomorrow's offline, I now have to drop out as it seems I will be elsewhere in the country tomorrow.

Enjoy yourselves chaps. Toast my absence.

Updated draft of the placemats.

• ”“AHB ;
• JDAW₁, JDAWâ‚‚ .

There are placemats waiting at TBH for the first to arrive.

bottle decanted at 7am, and tasting rather delicious (yes, I had a quick sip just to make sure it wasn't a duffer), suprisingly good for 0h decant time
Am aiming for an assumed 6:30 meeting time.

My two decanted into other bottles at 3pm-ish, and left at TBH. The first to arrive will have something to drink.

Links:

• Review of the evening as a whole;
• 1999 Infantado (JDAW₁);
• 1977 Dow (JDAWâ‚‚);
• 1985 Martinez (DRT);
• 1977 Taylor (PW);
• 1980 Quarles Harris (RAYC).