A Single Harvest Port for an Anniversary

There is a growing market for anniversary wines and, with their longevity and staying power, fortified wines have a captive market. 1966 was of course a declared Port vintage and anyone born in that year certainly has a wine for life (search for notes on Fonseca 1966 for example on this website). But there is also a fashion for single harvest Ports (known in Portugal as colheita) which the so-called 'British shippers' have latched on to in recent years. The Fladgate Partnership (who own Taylor's) have gone as far as buying up a small Portuguese shipper, Wiese & Krohn, famous for their stock of impeccably kept colheita Ports, some going back to the nineteenth century.  This wine, recently released by Taylor’s, is a good example of the genre and makes a beautiful celebratory wine in 2006. It is available for around £120. 

Taylor Single Harvest 1966 ****/*****

Pale tawny-amber in hue; open, fragrant aromas, milk chocolate and violets, delicate and perfumed; soft, suave and very pure with overly rich, intense dried fruit character (dried apricots and figs), elegant and mellifluous  (183 g/l residual sugar) stopping well short of being unctuous. Silky, without a trace of tannin, yet still beautifully fresh for its age with a long finish redolent of Manuka honey.  18.5