Despite the sales of Port Wine in Germany present a negative trend over the last 5 years (-12% in value), Axel Probst from World of Port and Christopher Pfaff from Passion Port keep entertaining Port lovers, organizing tastings that bring German consumers to meet Port winemakers. Contrarily to the neighbors from Belgium where the annual consumption of Port per capita is 0.9L, or Dutch which drinks 0.7L, in Germany this figure drops to 0.04L. There is a lot to do to educate German palates for Port, which it is something that takes time and time and time.

The event that Axel and Christopher organized in November 2012 was focused on 20 Year Old Tawnies versus Vintage Port from 1991 and 1992. As you will have the opportunity to see in the video, the colours of these two styles vary from amber/orange/brownish of the 20 Year Old Tawny to cherry colour that this 20+ years old Vintage Ports currently present. I am sure you know that this colour difference is explained by the aging process of these two styles: Tawnies in pipas while Vintage ages in the bottle. End with explanations, lets grab a glass of Port and watch Christopher’s video.

Oscar

You are right, the mouth of this 14,000 liter balseiro is open. It is not that often that we rack our old Ports. This is the balseiro where our Colheita 1994 has aged for several years. But now it’s time for it to go to smaller containers. It will age in 605 – 615 liters pipas, some older than anyone of us, while others no more than 10 years old.

Why did we decided to change? While aging in balseiros, the Port will have little contact with oak, as the area per volume of contact is reduced. But if we switch it for pipos, Port will be more influenced by the oak. The fruity flavours conserve longer if the Port is aged in bigger containers but smaller containers will help the wine to reach elegance, nut flavors and sometimes chocolate. And this is the way my sister Claudia and me thought the Colheita 1994 should develop to. On the other hand, Colheita 1996 reached such a balance between fruit and oxidation in these same pipos, that we would like our 1994 Colheita to inherit it too.

We have bottled 3,000 bottles of 1996 Colheita few weeks ago, while for the 1994 we put apart 2,800 liters, to be bottled in the next weeks. No more bottling of any of these wines is planned for the next 12 months. These bottles have to be enough for all of us!

Oscar