Product information

Quinta do Passadouro Vintage Port 2019

Port from Douro, Portugal

$121

$116ea in any 3+
$111ea in any 6+
Closure: Cork
A stunning new addition to the Noval range!

Description

In 2019 Quinta do Noval acquired a second estate in Portugal’s Douro Valley: Quinta do Passadouro. The first Vintage Port produced under Noval’s ownership, 2019 was an excellent year to year to kick of proceedings! A blend of Touriga Nacional, Touriga Francesa, Tinto Cão, Sousão and Tinta Roriz made the same style as Noval’s own Vintage Port. It displays the estate’s signature class and sophistication, while offering a more medium bodied, youthfully buoyant and immedicably approachable wine.


“It has a rich and quite decadent bouquet with black plum, Christmas cake, marmalade and a touch of eau-de-vie. The palate is medium-bodied with a light sprinkling of white pepper, black cherries and boysenberry jam. There is a crisp line of acidity here and fine precision. Excellent.”

Neal Martin, The Wine Advocate

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Why is this Wine so Yummy?

In 2019 Quinta do Noval acquired a second estate in Portugal’s Douro Valley: Quinta do Passadouro. Quinta do Passadouro dates to the 18th century and has long been highly regarded for both its Ports and table wines. The property is in the Cima Corgo sub-region, close to the village of Vale de Mendiz in the heart of the demarcated Douro region. Since 1991, the estate has been well run by the Bohrmann family, who also own a domaine in Burgundy.

Passadouro is a blend of Touriga Nacional, Touriga Francesa, Tinto Cão, Sousão and Tinta Roriz picked between 9th of September to 18th of October. The quinta’s vines range in altitude from 100 to 300 metres above sea level requiring a multi-tiered harvest. Made in roughly the same fashion and Noval’s own Vintage Port, the style here—while also one of class and sophistication—is more medium bodied, youthfully buoyant and immedicably approachable than the Noval.

About Vintage Port

Vintage Port is one of the world’s most extreme styles. It’s only made in the best years when the ‘Vintage is Declared’. Taylor’s and Fonseca are two of the very best houses.

Take an array of red varieties with different personalities, throw them in a lagare, grab a couple dozen stompers and get them to tread the grapes, ferment it for a bit then pour in some brandy spirit leaving you with high sugar, tannin, acid, and, alcohol backed by rich fruit.

On face value how could it work? Like all the great wine styles in the world the top echelon, the best houses of Portugal have found a way.

The searing acidity of the best vintage ports and exceptional tannins balances the sweetness of the sugar, alcohol and of course fruit. Despite the strength of these superb wines they have amazing finesse, elegance, and, restraint.

The complexity of these wines offers such intrigue!

The Importance of Blending

At Yarra Yering we made a VP style, the Port Sorts, renamed Pot Sorts for export after naming rights for the use of Port were granted solely to the Portuguese.

Made from the traditional Port varieties, Touriga Nacional provides structural tannin backbone, earthiness, and a core of fruit. Tinta Cão fruit richness. Tinta Roriz (Tempranillo) and Tinta Amarela the acid component.

In addition to the above the best known red varieties for Port production include the Touriga Francesa, and, Tinta Barroca but in total there are around thirty types of Port grape. Most of these varieties have relatively small thick-skinned berries which produce the dense concentrated must (grape juice) needed to make Port.

Although they may be planted separately, the varieties are normally harvested and fermented together. Each grape variety contributes its own particular character – such as the intense flavours of woodland fruit, delicate floral scents, exotic spicy notes or the wild resiny aromas of gumcistus – to the nose of the wine. The grape varieties work together like instruments in an orchestra to create a subtle, complex and multi-dimensional harmony.

Making Port

Port is a fortified wine. Fortified wines are made by adding a proportion of grape spirit, or brandy, to the wine at some point during the production process. Port is arguably the greatest of all fortified wines and its paramount expression, Vintage Port, ranks alongside the finest produce of Bordeaux or Burgundy as one of the great iconic wines of the world.

In the case of Port, the addition of the brandy takes place before the wine has finished fermenting. This means that the wine retains some of the natural sweetness of the grape, making it rich, round and smooth on the palate.

One of the fascinating aspects of Port wine is its variety of different styles, each with its own characteristic flavours, from the intense berry fruit flavours of a Reserve or a Late Bottled Vintage to the rich mellowness of an Aged Tawny or the sublime complexity of a Vintage Port.

About Quinta do Noval

Quinta do Noval is one of the great Port houses. Not only does Noval produce the most famous Vintage Port of them all, the legendary ‘Nacional’, it was also the creator of the “Late Bottled” style in 1954 and of single vintage Tawnies (Colheita) in 1954. It is also the only big name producer whose top wines are exclusively single vineyard (i.e. “Quinta”). Think of the difference between a Burgundy domaine and a Burgundy negociant to get an idea of what this means. The Vintage Ports of Quinta do Noval (including Nacional) have always been from the same vineyard. The quality of all Quinta do Noval’s wines has gone through the roof since the early 1990’s when Englishman Christian Seely was put in charge. Many changes occurred, however none have affected the production methods of Noval’s estate-produced Ports that continue to be hand picked from the ancient terraces, foot crushed and fermented in stone lagares (which Noval believes is still the best way to produce quality Port). Today, Noval’s vintage and Colheita Ports (vintage-dated Tawnies) are all made exclusively from estate-grown grapes. This contrasts radically with all of the other big names of the region who buy fruit to blend to a house style. A high percentage of the blends for Noval’s LBV, LB (vintage character) and Old Tawnies – 10, 20 and over 40 Years Old – also come from the estate.

Since the ’94 vintage, the first under Christian Seely, the Quinta do Noval Vintage Ports have always been rated amongst the best of the region, often rivalling Nacional in blind tastings. As both Robert Parker and James Suckling have noted, the Quinta do Noval 1994 Vintage Port was the best VP from the domaine for decades and each VP release since then has been outstanding. Meanwhile the Tawnies and the Late Bottle Vintage are now leaders of their respective categories. The Quinta do Noval Silval Vintage Ports (often containing the declassified Nacional and Quinta VP’s in undeclared vintages like 2005) today offer wonderful value for money.

Although most famous for its Ports, the Quinta do Noval estate is far from a mono-culture: it also produces world class red and white table wines, vegetables, herbs, olives, olive oil, oranges, figs, clementines, walnuts and pigs. We ship the wines, ports and olive oils.
In an interesting side bar reflecting Quinta do Noval’s standing in the world of wine and beyond, US President Barack Obama was possibly the first person to receive an allocation of 2008 Quinta do Noval Vintage (which we offer here!) when he was presented with a single bottle by Portuguese President Cavaco Silva at the 2008 NATO summit (2008 being the year when the US President took office). In return, President Cavaco Silva received a copy of the very first treaty signed between Portugal and the United States – you work out who got the best gift!

Drinking Vintage Port

🍷DECANTING – Vintage Port forms a natural deposit in the bottle and should be decanted. Stand the bottle upright a few hours before decanting to allow the sediment to fall to the bottom of the bottle.

🌡SERVING TEMPERATURE – Serve at 16ºC to 18ºC. Vintage Port is best drunk one to two days after opening.

🍑🧀PAIRING SUGGESTIONS – Walnuts, blue veined and other richly flavoured cheeses are excellent accompaniments to Vintage Port; so too are dried fruits such as apricots or figs.

⏰HOW WILL IT KEEP AFTER OPENNING – Once the cork is popped

The 2019 Vintage at Quinta do Noval

2019 was marked by a mild winter and generally dry conditions, with almost no rain from May to the end of August. While in many parts of Europe producers faced heatwaves, and although we enjoyed prolonged sunny weather, summer temperatures in the Douro were fortunately lower than usual this year, making the absence of rain easier to bear for the vines. Moreover, low humidity led to low disease pressure in the vineyards and beautiful healthy grapes.

Harvest started on September 9th for the red varieties. Harvesting conditions were ideal, with moderate temperatures and overall dry weather. A small amount of helpful rain fell on September 21st/22nd and later between October 14th and 17th.
Yields were slightly higher than our 10-year average and musts showed great natural acidity and freshness.
We finished harvesting on October 18th after 6 weeks of picking. This was a long harvest, but this is not unusual in the Douro, where the diversity of grape varieties, aspects and altitudes results in different picking times for each specific plot.
This diversity represents a challenge for the technical team but also an incredible richness, adding complexity and character to our wines at Quinta do Noval.

Early tastings revealed some marvelous wines. They display pronounced aromatic intensity of ripe red fruit and remarkable vivacity. The fine quality of the tannins contributes to well-structured Ports with long ageing potential.

Where in the World is Quinta do Noval?

92 Points

It has a rich and quite decadent bouquet with black plum, Christmas cake, marmalade and a touch of eau-de-vie. The palate is medium-bodied with a light sprinkling of white pepper, black cherries and boysenberry jam. There is a crisp line of acidity here and fine precision. Excellent.

Neal Martin, The Wine Advocate

Where in the world does the magic happen?

Quinta do Noval, Avenida de Diogo Leite, Vila Nova de Gaia, Portugal

Douro
Portugal