Port & Sherry
Fortified wines — the most notable being Port and sherry — are made by adding a neutral spirit (usually brandy) to stop fermentation and raise the alcohol level of the wine. This process allows fortified wines to age longer in the bottle and to remain fresh for a longer period after they have been opened. Fortified wines can be made from white or red grapes and run the gamut from dry to sweet, introducing a range of distinct styles. A favorite dessert wine, Port, is a fortified wine made in the Douro region of Portugal from a variety of different grapes. Port can be unaged or aged in wood barrels to create Ruby Port or aged for extended periods of time, even decades, to create Tawny. The best Port vintages are extensively aged to create Vintage Port, which can develop and improve for decades. Madeira is also a Portuguese fortified wine, but it is made on the Madeira Islands off the coast of Africa. Styles of Madeira run from the very dry Sercial, which is typically enjoyed as an aperitif, to the decadently sweet Malvasia, which is usually paired with desserts. Showing similar versatility is the Spanish fortified wine Sherry. Sherry is typically made with the Palomino grape and ranges from the dry Fino to the very sweet Jerez Dulce, which is often made with Pedro Ximénez grapes. Marsala is Italy’s versatile fortified wine, drawing from the city of Marsala in Sicily, and it too can range from dry to sweet. Today, Marsala is most commonly used in Italian cooking — dry versions appearing in sauces and sweet versions appearing in desserts. A final wine that deserves note is Vermouth, for which we have a dedicated section.
Top Port & Sherry Posts:
Exploring Port Wine: Touring Porto and the Douro Valley
What is Fortified Wine and How Is It Made?
2016 Vintage Port (and Beyond)
Madeira Wine 2018
Hidalgo Fino and Bodegas Dios Baco Oxford 1.970 Pedro Ximenez Sherry
It’s been four years since we saw an LBV bottling from Dow’s, with the 2011 vintage. 2015 was not a declared vintage for most Port houses, though Dow’s had a notable small release from a ...
Madera, California-based Quady is one of the most venerable names in U.S. dessert wines, its history dating back to 1975. Quady’s still at it, with a collection of vintage Port-like wines which it cheekily refers ...
It’s been six years since we checked in with Inniskillin (and six more years before that), so it’s high time we sampled the Canadian winery’s icewines once again. Inniskillin makes icewine (aka ice wine) from ...
Like Graham’s Six Grapes and Sandeman’s Founders Reserve, Fonseca Bin 27 is a widely available and top-selling ruby Port wine with wide availability, produced by one of Portugal’s most notable producers. We last encountered Bin ...
It’s the 10th anniversary of “Tio Pepe En Rama,” the Jerez winery’s special edition Fino style sherry that is bottled unclarified and unfiltered. 67 casks were used to create this 2019 bottling, which is intended ...
We’ve covered Graham’s 10 year old tawny Port a couple of times, but this is our first formal go-round with the 20 year old. This expression is a quite sweet raisin bomb up front, with ...
Croft Pink was the first Rose Port, and remains the most popular on the market (at least from my perspective). The style has been around only since 2008, but since that time dozens of major ...
This will hurt some people’s feelings, so I’m just going to come right out and say it: dark chocolate does not pair well with wine. After a meal, nothing is classier than setting out some ...
Jose Maria da Fonseca is one of those rarities we don’t see enough of in the U.S.: A Portuguese wine producer that makes red table wines (in addition to some sweet stuff). Established in 1834, ...
We’ve covered Madeira wine extensively in past dispatches. Today we’re looking at three Madeira wines from Miles, which is part of the Blandy family’s Madeira Wine Company, a producer that has been producing wine on ...
