Graham's Vintage 2000

Graham's

Origin

Portugal

Type

Vintage Port

Barrel

Large Vat

Age

Vintage (2000)

Alcohol

20°

Value

200 points

About the product

Vintage Porto is probably the type that most captures the imagination. It is wine that ages exceptionally well and challenges you to wait long enough to open the bottle. No easy feat, as they are usually delicious wines.

Vintage port belongs to the Ruby port family. These wines are allowed to age in large wooden barrels for up to two years before bottling, specifically with the aim of further aging in bottle. Vintage port may only be made in very good vintages and from the 1-year grape harvest. To be approved for a Vintage declaration, samples of the ageing wine are delivered to the Instituto do Douro e do Porto (IVDP) in the second year after harvest, for chemical and organoleptic analysis. Only if the results of that analysis are at least 9/10 will the wine be awarded the certificate of Vintage porto.

When you open a bottle of Vintage porto, it is best to decant it first, as there will be some sediment at the bottom. You then treat the bottle like any other ‘ordinary’ wine: it is best to drink it within a reasonable time, this is not a wine meant to be left open in your cupboard for a long time! So invite some friends over and enjoy a Vintage port together.

This Vintage 2000 from Graham's, for example. It is a wine made from grapes from Graham's four different vineyards and it is known for its huge concentration of flavours. There were also relatively few Vintage porto produced in 2000, so it is a rather rare bottle. You'll find the typical Graham's aromas in it: ripe plum and ‘esteva’. It is particularly soft, but at the same time full and rich with fresh blackcurrant and red plum. The finish is long and clean. The ideal partner with a dessert with chocolate, but it can certainly seduce you on its own too.

About the brand

Graham's Port is the absolute reference when it comes to quality port. It is a house with a long and fascinating history that has been committed to producing products of absolute top quality, in all price ranges, for more than 200 years.

The story starts in 1820, when brothers William and John Graham founded the house. Soon the Graham's name became synonymous with quality, leading to the construction of the Graham's Lodge in Gaia and the acquisition of the Quinta Dos Malvedos in 1890. That was one of the first times a porto house invested in land in the upper Douro Valley. Eight years earlier, in 1882, one Andrew James Symington had moved from Scotland to Porto to work for the Graham family. There lies the seed of the link between the two families. In 1970, Andrew's grandsons would take over the business from the Grahams and build it into what it has become today.

Graham's wines are still produced and blended using traditional methods. It is master blender Charles Symington himself who tastes all the maturing wines and decides which barrels can be bottled or blended when. There is no scientific analysis involved, it is based entirely on the combined skill and experience of the experienced winemakers in Charles Symington's team.

Graham's has several vineyards, of which Quinta Dos Malvedos is the most important and prestigious - the vines in this Quinta enjoy the best the Douro Valley has to offer: abundant sunshine and reasonable rainfall. Other Graham's vineyards include Quinta do Tua, Quinta da Vila Velha and Quinta do Vale de Malhadas.