Niepoort Vintage Port 1987

Looks like the same wine:

And it is. But tasted three years apart, it couldn’t show more differently.

Wine is strange. I had two bottles of this 1987 in October 2006 and January 2007 (see review in Polish here, and pictures here), and thoroughly loved it. 1987 as a vintage doesn’t enjoy a spectacular reputation for vintage port, and many producers did not ‘declare’ their flagship wine, released single-quinta wines instead (notably the Symington estates, Fonseca and Taylor; the latter’s Quinta das Vargellas has consistently shone in recent years). Niepoort didn’t hold back and I’m glad they didn’t. Three years ago this wine was showing in absolutely top shape with little agedness to it, citrusy freshness, stupendous balance and an absolutely delightful ‘vinousness’ to it: it was tasting like a serious, brooding dry Portuguese red with a few years of age, less sweet and liqueury than most ports (a style I sometimes refer to as ‘Burgundian’ port). I really loved that character and I loved the quality.

I tasted this again from two bottles for the WINO Magazine awards. No aroma, no flavour. High alcohol and a muddy, pilly kind of sweetness. An unattractive herby bitterish dryness on palate; medicinal. Not that it has evolved since 2006/7: in fact it was showing just as youthful. It was just flat and inexpressive. But clean and longish on the palate, so the theory of a low-threshold TCA taint is rather to be rejected. It was not bottle variation, and not a ‘root day’ (I drank up the remainder of the bottle over three days: no improvement, in fact rather deterioration).

Wine tasting is slippery territory. There are lots of variables, and impressions are fairly volatile. One minute it’s raspberries over citrus in your Beaujolais, and the next minute it’s strawberries with lower acidity. I challenge anyone to produce exactly the same tasting note from the first and last glass of any given bottle. When you think you’ve finally grasped it, summarising your impressions in a satisfying synthetic description, the next bottle will be vastly divergent. After my 2006/7 tasting of this 1987 Niepoort I spent quite a few €€€ on three bottles of this wine. Now I’m nonplussed. Should I open one to see if it’s the same disappointing wine of a week ago? Or save them in hope the wine will reemerge from its dumb phase?