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Here KillerB posted a tasting note about Cockburn's Special Reserve Port. He describes it as "gloopy, sweet, red and horrible".

It sounds vaguely similar to a tasting note I once read that went along the lines of "gloopy, sweet, pink, horrible and not port".

So what makes the first one port and the second one not?

(Note to moderators: I have deliberately put this thread into meaningless drivel as it is not a conversation about port but one about winding people up...)

Pink. I think.

Addressing Alex's question, perhaps there is a use for scoring. If you can score anything, at what point does it cease to be sufficiently interesting to be worth thinking of as port or claret or...

Does a score of, say, 70 send it below the horizon? Should the score be determined by an acknowledged expert or an amateur? Should we vest in Emperor Parker the right to determine when port is port or just a sad pretender?

Overtired and Emotional wrote:Should we vest in Emperor Parker the right to determine when port is port or just a sad pretender?

No. He doesn't "get" Port. Vest in Uncle Tom.

This thread has just made me have a horrible thought:

Cockburn's Special Reserve Pink Port

I've said it before and I will say it again:

The thing about Port is that it is a red drink

It is not white, it is not pink, it is red. Cock burns is a Port despite my protestations as is Cruz Ruby. I am considering changing the first level to be Cockburn's Special Reserve as it is patently worse than the Cruz.

Now this I can accept and it is pretty close to my own personal view that all other drinks are only a prelude to Vintage Port.

If someone is prepared to stand up and say that wierd white stuff is not port and neither is the luminous pink stuff then I can respect and even agree with that.

What I have difficulty with is someone saying the white stuff is port but the pink stuff isn't.

KillerB wrote:The thing about Port is that it is a red drink

Can be brown.

jdaw1 wrote:

KillerB wrote:The thing about Port is that it is a red drink

Can be brown.

Shouldn't be

KillerB wrote:

jdaw1 wrote:

KillerB wrote:The thing about Port is that it is a red drink

Can be brown.

Shouldn't be

Are you now saying that Niepoort Colheita 1937 isn't port?

Derek T. wrote:

KillerB wrote:

jdaw1 wrote:

KillerB wrote:The thing about Port is that it is a red drink

Can be brown.

Shouldn't be

Are you now saying that Niepoort Colheita 1937 isn't port?

It's tawny, there's a difference - just ask the owls.

KillerB wrote:

Derek T. wrote:

KillerB wrote:

jdaw1 wrote:

KillerB wrote:The thing about Port is that it is a red drink

Can be brown.

Shouldn't be

Are you now saying that Niepoort Colheita 1937 isn't port?

It's tawny, there's a difference - just ask the owls.

OK. I think I am on fairly thin ice with my claim that Pink Port isn't Port but you are plumeting to the bottom of the pond if you think you can get away with dismissing 50% of the port produced as "not port"

Derek T. wrote:

KillerB wrote:

Derek T. wrote:

KillerB wrote:

jdaw1 wrote:

KillerB wrote:The thing about Port is that it is a red drink

Can be brown.

Shouldn't be

Are you now saying that Niepoort Colheita 1937 isn't port?

It's tawny, there's a difference - just ask the owls.

OK. I think I am on fairly thin ice with my claim that Pink Port isn't Port but you are plumeting to the bottom of the pond if you think you can get away with dismissing 50% of the port produced as "not port"

I'm not claiming tawnies are not Port, I'm claiming them to be not brown. If you see a tawny owl and a brown owl they are different. Tawny is a sort of mucky red, orangey, and therefore fits in with red, although only very vaguely, I concede.

KillerB wrote:

Derek T. wrote:

KillerB wrote:

Derek T. wrote:

KillerB wrote:

jdaw1 wrote:

KillerB wrote:The thing about Port is that it is a red drink

Can be brown.

Shouldn't be

Are you now saying that Niepoort Colheita 1937 isn't port?

It's tawny, there's a difference - just ask the owls.

OK. I think I am on fairly thin ice with my claim that Pink Port isn't Port but you are plumeting to the bottom of the pond if you think you can get away with dismissing 50% of the port produced as "not port"

I'm not claiming tawnies are not Port, I'm claiming them to be not brown. If you see a tawny owl and a brown owl they are different. Tawny is a sort of mucky red, orangey, and therefore fits in with red, although only very vaguely, I concede.

Steady! I think you are opening up an oportunity for Pinkolites to argue that theirs is as close to red as a tawny is.

Derek T. wrote:

KillerB wrote:

Derek T. wrote:

KillerB wrote:

Derek T. wrote:

KillerB wrote:

jdaw1 wrote:

KillerB wrote:The thing about Port is that it is a red drink

Can be brown.

Shouldn't be

Are you now saying that Niepoort Colheita 1937 isn't port?

It's tawny, there's a difference - just ask the owls.

OK. I think I am on fairly thin ice with my claim that Pink Port isn't Port but you are plumeting to the bottom of the pond if you think you can get away with dismissing 50% of the port produced as "not port"

I'm not claiming tawnies are not Port, I'm claiming them to be not brown. If you see a tawny owl and a brown owl they are different. Tawny is a sort of mucky red, orangey, and therefore fits in with red, although only very vaguely, I concede.

Steady! I think you are opening up an oportunity for Pinkolites to argue that theirs is as close to red as a tawny is.

There's no need for that, shame on you.

I was merely observing that old vintage port is brown, not red.

jdaw1 wrote:I was merely observing that old vintage port is brown, not red.

...and look what happened.

Anyway, old VP is just "tired" red.

I've always considered Port to be purple. As in Purple Sunshine!

My slightly facetious reference to scoring aimed at finding a use for what I think is otherwise useless, towit a subjectively constructed means of objectively saying that something purporting to be port is so awful that it is unworthy of the name.

I did not anticipate that some questioned whether white port is port, at least I guess that is what KillerB and others aimed at.

Is there, in fact, an objective definition of port? I would have thought that the Institute prescribes one.

I ought to find out for myself but I'm sittiing at home suffering overpowering ennui whilst outside it is p*ss*ng down stair rods.