Hotel or Restaurant Price List of the Week

[MigSU]

Bioma 2017 £3,000 a bottle from Portugal Vineyards.

It is entirely up to Dirk whether he undertakes radical repricing but I will not be buying any.

No other vintage of Bioma (16,15,13,11,9,8) is more than about £120.

It's Bioma Vinha da Pisca, which is a different wine from Bioma Vinhas Velhas (which is price as a 'regular' VP).

[PCM]

Bioma 2017 £3,000 a bottle from Portugal Vineyards.

It is entirely up to Dirk whether he undertakes radical repricing but I will not be buying any.

No other vintage of Bioma (16,15,13,11,9,8) is more than about £120.

It's Bioma Vinha da Pisca, which is a different wine from Bioma Vinhas Velhas (which is price as a 'regular' VP).

I've always thought (and I am pretty sure) that Bioma Vinhas Velhas comes from Vinha da Pisca, so what has changed?? I fully agree with Winesecretary that I wouldn't think a second of buying it for that ridiculous price!!

[MigSU]

Bioma 2017 £3,000 a bottle from Portugal Vineyards.

It is entirely up to Dirk whether he undertakes radical repricing but I will not be buying any.

No other vintage of Bioma (16,15,13,11,9,8) is more than about £120.

It's Bioma Vinha da Pisca, which is a different wine from Bioma Vinhas Velhas (which is price as a 'regular' VP).

I've always thought (and I am pretty sure) that Bioma Vinhas Velhas comes from Vinha da Pisca, so what has changed?? I fully agree with Winesecretary that I wouldn't think a second of buying it for that ridiculous price!!

It does! But now it's named as such

[winesecretary]

If it is actually a different wine, as opposed to a rebranding, I should correct my previous email. Is it actually a different wine, a super-super-selection? I have not seen any 'straight' Bioma Vinha Velha from 2017 for sale

[MigSU]

If it is actually a different wine, as opposed to a rebranding, I shod correct my previous email. Is it actually a different wine, a super-super-selection? I have not seen any 'straight' Bioma Vinha Velha from 2017 for sale

No, I think they discontinued that particular branding, switching VV for Vinha da Pisca.

Now, could this be the exact same wine, just rebranded and with a 40x price increase? I have no idea, but it would be incredibly scummy if it were the case.

[JacobH]

Bioma 2017 £3,000 a bottle from Portugal Vineyards.

Gosh. I wasn’t expecting that That’s the same price as a six-pack of the most recent Garrafeira release. Although I can’t actually see much of it for sale. Perhaps they only produced one pipe? But then trying to understand the Niepoort range is a bit of a mystery with new products being launched and discontinued all the time.

As to whether the 2017 is a different product to the 2016, looking on the Niepoort website there isn’t anything that obviously screams out that the 2017 is very different from the 2016. It talks about the traditional method (i.e. longer ageing in smaller barrels). The 2016 is described as a “single vineyard Vintage Port, rather than a Single Quinta wine”, although only the 2008 and the 2017 gives the name of the vineyard as Vinha da Pisca.

Someone told me that the reason why there was a name change from the 2007 (which was called “Pisca”) to 2008 (which was the first “Bioma”) was because of some trademark issue with the word “Pisca”. Maybe that’s now been resolved which is why the blurbs don’t mention the name of the vineyard between 2009 and 2016?

That, of course, wouldn’t explain the huge jump in price. It also doesn’t explain why there isn’t a 2018 or 2019: whilst Niepoort only declared 2019, there have been some Biomas in years where there was no classic VP blend. Perhaps they’ve decided to discontinue it and go out with a bang (to cause trouble for anyone trying to arrange a vertical tasting ).

[Glenn E.]

The oddball (to me) in that tasting is the Bioma. I realize that the Pisca vineyard is old vines, but the wine made from it is not on the same level as the other 3 super cuvees in that flight.

Dirk has always made the Bioma as a super-selected, super-special super-cuvée with the intention that’s its quality would be at least as good as the other wines in this flight. Recently Niepoort have changed its pricing and market positioning to better reflect its quality and rarity. New releases of Bioma are sitting more in line with - or markedly above - the other super-cuvée Ports.

Have a look at the Bioma prices in the Niepoort lodge next time you’re in Oporto to see what I mean.

As we all know, what Dirk intended and what actually resulted are two different things. I have never found Bioma to be on par with VVV or more recently GST. It might be a cut above a regular Niepoort, but that doesn't necessarily make it on par with the rest of this flight. It's always been marketed as a "regular", albeit IIRC organic, Vintage Port. (I'm pretty sure the original 2007 Pisca was marketed as organic, at least. Can't remember if that continued with the name change to Bioma.)

Now if the 2017 Bioma Vinha da Pisca is indeed an all-new wine, then maybe this one is on par with the others. I wasn't aware that they'd changed the branding again and were making an all-new wine under the new branding.

[jdaw1]

But then trying to understand the Niepoort range is a bit of a mystery with new products being launched and discontinued all the time.

Some of which, perhaps many of which, are excellent. But for a wine category steeped in tradition, Niepoort range of products is very much a moveable feast.

[JacobH]

I have never found Bioma to be on par with VVV or more recently GST. It might be a cut above a regular Niepoort, but that doesn't necessarily make it on par with the rest of this flight. It's always been marketed as a "regular", albeit IIRC organic, Vintage Port.

It’s interesting that you say that. I’ve only tried the super-premiums occasionally and never very methodically.

Incidentally, by “super-premium”, I would define these as being Ports which are more expensive than a shipper’s classic VP blend. That can cover quite a range. I think the Bioma / Pisca (at least until 2017) was probably the most affordable of these, being about 20% more expensive than the standard VP blend.

How many of these are there now? Is it just these five: Graham’s Stone Terraces; Taylor’s QdVVV; Qd Noval Nacional; Niepoort Bioma (& friends); and Croft Sērikos? I think, in order of price, it is something like Niepoort, Croft, Graham’s, Taylor’s, QdN? Is that a fair reflection of their relative quality?

I’ve tried various vintages of all of them apart from the Croft. The difficulty that I’ve always had is that whilst they have generally been better than the standard blends, I’m never quite sure the improvement is worth the premium.

[Andy Velebil]

Niepoort had a horrible wine naming issue, with ports and even more so table wines. It’s confusing as all get out. So much so that I’ve stopped buying certainly of his wines because I can never figure out where they actually fall in his lineup. I generally stick to the old standbys.

The style of Bioma is not what Glenn prefers in a port so it’s no wonder he’s not a fan as much as others. Just saying.

[PhilW]

How many of these are there now? Is it just these five: Graham’s Stone Terraces; Taylor’s QdVVV; Qd Noval Nacional; Niepoort Bioma (& friends); and Croft Sērikos?

You're also missing at least Vesuvio Capela, and the Warre Vinha Velhas (only one release to date, in 2020 for the 350th anniversary of Warre). n.b. Croft Roeda Serikos.

I think, in order of price, it is something like Niepoort, Croft, Graham’s, Taylor’s, QdN? Is that a fair reflection of their relative quality?

I think that quality and pricing varies dramatically, never mind the QPR judgement, depending on which vintage as well as which brand we're discussing. Some are more prolific than others, and some longer established; in order of first vintage I think we have:

NN: 1931, 34, 47, 50, 55, 58, 60, 62, 63, 64, 66, 67, 70, 78, 80, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 91, 94, 96, 97, 2000, 03, 04, 11, 16, 17, 19, 20
TVVV: 1995, 97, 2000, 04, 07, 09, 11, 17
NiP/NiB: 2007 / 2008, 09, 11, 13, 15, 16
VC: 2007, 11, 16, 17
GST: 2011, 15, 16, 17
CrRS: 2017
WVV: 2020

[JacobH]

How many of these are there now? Is it just these five: Graham’s Stone Terraces; Taylor’s QdVVV; Qd Noval Nacional; Niepoort Bioma (& friends); and Croft Sērikos?

You're also missing at least Vesuvio Capela, and the Warre Vinha Velhas (only one release to date, in 2020 for the 350th anniversary of Warre). n.b. Croft Roeda Serikos.

Apologies. Don’t know how I’d forgotten about the Vesuvio!

Since Croft is apparently always a SQVP these days, I took the view that giving its full name was unnecessary. Unless it is to annoy Julian with the orthography.

I think that quality and pricing varies dramatically, never mind the QPR judgement, depending on which vintage as well as which brand we're discussing.

That was what I was wondering about. Nacional is the most infamous for having some weak years. I suppose a better question is to look from, say, the 2007 vintage onwards which is when this really got going as a concept.

[Glenn E.]

The style of Bioma is not what Glenn prefers in a port so it’s no wonder he’s not a fan as much as others. Just saying.

Actually, I find Bioma more pleasant than regular Niepoort Vintage Ports. It's certainly not on par with Graham or Vesuvio or Fonseca for me, but in this case I don't think that's the issue. And the 2017 was fantastic - I think I gave it 97 points? - so it's really only the older non-"Bioma Vinha da Pisca" that I'm talking about here.

The only super cuvees that I've tasted (and can recall off the top of my head) are GST, NN, TVVV, NiBi, and VC.

I don't think I'd count WVV as a super cuvee because - at least for now - it's a one-off and different in that sense that CrRS because the former's announcement made it sound like a special wine made for a special occasion, while the latter's announcement made it sound like a "me too!" super-premium to compete with the others.

[Doggett]

I thought the 2016 Bioma to be stunning but a very different style to all the others. To take a French wine analogy all the other 2016s I tasted were a Bordeaux style, while the Bioma was Burgundy like. Very different… unique and lovely!

[Alex Bridgeman]

There’s also a Ferreira Vinhas Velhas 2016, which was released alongside the “normal” Ferreira 2016 blend.

[JacobH]

Interesting. Thank you. I wonder if these will be a flash-in-the-pan (a bit like second label VPs like Sandeman Vau were in the late 1990s / early 2000s) or more sustainable. It also appears that there is an informal agreement that Vinhas Velhas is the appropriate name which seems quite sensible to me, although does clash with the use of VV on old tawnies.