1985 Churchill

Tasting notes for individual Ports, with an index sorted by vintage and alphabetically.
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Tasting notes for individual Ports, with an index sorted by vintage and alphabetically.
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winesecretary
Fonseca 1980
Posts: 1900
Joined: 15:35 Mon 13 May 2019

1985 Churchill

Post by winesecretary »

Fascinating. This is somewhat affected by VA. I couldn't at first tell whether it was also either badly corked; or slightly corked and suffering from a bacteriological problem. I have resorted to the clingfilm trick. Thereafter I think the latter is more accurate, but the VA is making it difficult to tell.

Underneath there is some quite pleasant mature red-fruited port.
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flash_uk
Graham’s 1977
Posts: 4081
Joined: 20:02 Thu 13 Feb 2014
Location: London

Re: 1985 Churchill

Post by flash_uk »

winesecretary wrote: 22:05 Thu 27 May 2021 I have resorted to the clingfilm trick.
Do say more...
PhilW
Dalva Golden White Colheita 1952
Posts: 3503
Joined: 14:22 Wed 15 Dec 2010
Location: Near Cambridge, UK

Re: 1985 Churchill

Post by PhilW »

Sounds like a very poor bottle of Ch85.
At one stage it was suggested that there might have been two bottlings, one better than the other, but having had quite a lot of these I think there is simply some variation, though most I've had have been very enjoyable. For a while this was one of the bottles I always included as the VP when hosting "introduction to port" tastings with a bottle of each style (reserve, LBV, VP, tawnies) as it was reliable as well as good QPR. I hope that if you have other bottles, that they should show a lot better.
MigSU
Warre’s Otima 10 year old Tawny
Posts: 634
Joined: 13:22 Wed 17 Feb 2021
Location: Douro Valley

Re: 1985 Churchill

Post by MigSU »

flash_uk wrote: 09:00 Fri 28 May 2021
winesecretary wrote: 22:05 Thu 27 May 2021 I have resorted to the clingfilm trick.
Do say more...
Maybe covering the top with clingfilm, and if it bulges then you have bacteriological activity? That's the only thing I can think of, but, like you, I'm also intrigued.
winesecretary
Fonseca 1980
Posts: 1900
Joined: 15:35 Mon 13 May 2019

Re: 1985 Churchill

Post by winesecretary »

2,4,6 trichloroanisole bonds to polyvinylchloride in preference to remaining in a wine. So if you roughly place a couple of feet of PVC (not LDPE) clingfilm in a bowl and pour the wine over it and leave it half an hour then extract and dispose of the PVC you will lessen the corkiness. It rarely makes the wine enjoyable drinking, since we are so sensitive to TCA (except Glenn) and some usually remains, but it is a useful test to see whether what you were detecting was TCA or another fault. In this case, lessening the TCA enabled me to confirm my suspicion that the wine was dirty as well as corked.
akzy
Warre’s Otima 10 year old Tawny
Posts: 537
Joined: 21:42 Tue 13 Nov 2018
Location: Three Bridges

Re: 1985 Churchill

Post by akzy »

winesecretary wrote: 09:27 Fri 28 May 2021 2,4,6 trichloroanisole bonds to polyvinylchloride in preference to remaining in a wine. So if you roughly place a couple of feet of PVC (not LDPE) clingfilm in a bowl and pour the wine over it and leave it half an hour then extract and dispose of the PVC you will lessen the corkiness. It rarely makes the wine enjoyable drinking, since we are so sensitive to TCA (except Glenn) and some usually remains, but it is a useful test to see whether what you were detecting was TCA or another fault. In this case, lessening the TCA enabled me to confirm my suspicion that the wine was dirty as well as corked.
Ooooh, science! That's is a brilliant trick - thanks for sharing George.
MigSU
Warre’s Otima 10 year old Tawny
Posts: 634
Joined: 13:22 Wed 17 Feb 2021
Location: Douro Valley

Re: 1985 Churchill

Post by MigSU »

That's a neat trick.
Glenn E.
Graham’s 1977
Posts: 4172
Joined: 22:27 Wed 09 Jul 2008
Location: Seattle, WA, USA

Re: 1985 Churchill

Post by Glenn E. »

PhilW wrote: 09:08 Fri 28 May 2021 Sounds like a very poor bottle of Ch85.
Agreed. I bought a case of Ch85 after Julian introduced me to it (in Paris, as I recall), and my bottles have all been very nice. It isn't an astoundingly good Port even with the best bottles, but I've routinely rated it around 92-94 points. Its style is almost too dry for me, but not quite so I still find it enjoyable and one of the better VPs from 1985 after you drop below F85 and G85.
Glenn Elliott
winesecretary
Fonseca 1980
Posts: 1900
Joined: 15:35 Mon 13 May 2019

Re: 1985 Churchill

Post by winesecretary »

I wholly agree this was a poor bottle. I still drank three glasses of it, over three days, despite its faults, but in the end it went down the sink.

I've had and enjoyed G85 a couple of times recently. t's been a long time since I had any F85. I need to rectify that.
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