ThePortForum.com

I've been reading Mayson's Port & the Douro again. This time I gave his piece on grape varieties a go. What an informative but odd read.
He states that there are close to a 100 Grape varieties, and that Vineyards can be a complete jumbled mess. He also says that since 1981, there has been an attepmt to re-organise and go for a tad of consistancy.
They came up with the Big 5 Grapes (Top cinco) and replanting schemes and recommendations. Yet they still only called those top five varities 'Recommended'. Whilst all the others were categorised as 'Authorised'!
Anything that I hear of were the Port Authorities decide to act, always ends up with me thinking there's a splash of 'Dads Army' about it.
I left the Chapter more confused than ever. How do they end up with such a glorious product??? All different types of grapes, presumably not all ripening on the same day. Shifting yearly percentages of grape varieties, as one variety flourishes and another wanes.
I wont go on, as my head started to hurt. Have I read this organised chaos, wrong? Or are we just very lucky with what we end up with, and best leave it at that?

Alan

Nature tends toward chaos - in chaos is found perfection..!

I'm slightly twitchy about the Touriga Nacional cult - an awful lot of new VP production is derived from this vine - which seems to work as far as the producers are concerned, as it gives them good press when the wines are released.

But that's not when vintage ports should be drunk. Thirty years ago, only one vine in 200 was a TN, and that was before clonal selection - so there's a lot of dabbling with the unknown going on.

I have this nagging feeling that a rich cocktail of vine types is needed for a really good lasting wine, and that the high yield TN wines may well be hollow or unbalanced by the time they hit 40.

Hopefully I'm wrong!

Tom

Conky wrote:How do they end up with such a glorious product??? All different types of grapes, presumably not all ripening on the same day. Shifting yearly percentages of grape varieties, as one variety flourishes and another wanes.

I think this precisely why the product is so good. The formula has endless permutations and each blender is forced to select only the best of the best of the best (copyright M.I.B.), and each of these at precicely the right time, to produce a true classic vintage.

I hate the notion of Quinta's becoming places where the premium product could be produced with little or no knowledge of the winemaking process.

I would happily trade consistancy for variety any day

Derek