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.
Select Year
2003
Storage
Continues to improve for decades after bottling. The bottle should be kept lain down in a cool place, ideally at a temperature below 16ºC.
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.
Select Year
About the Wine
The Winter preceeding the 2003 harvest was very wet. Flowering took place in bright warm weather at the end of May in some of the best conditions seen for several years.
The first two weeks of August provided the intense Summer heat which often precedes a great Port Vintage. The picking season in September was warm, dry and the yields were even across all grape varieties, ensuring balance and complexity in the wines.
The 2003 Vintage Port is an absolute blockbuster, which according to Robert Parker, ‘will proudly stand shoulder to shoulder with the finest ever crafted by Taylor’s.’
Tasting Notes
Rich purple, red in colour, with a vibrant rim. A nose of great purity opening on a note of lovely floral, aromatic blueberry and blackberry. The palate is concentrated with beautifully pure sweet fruit and a lovely spicy, savoury, silky tannic structure. Rock rose and violets, liquorice, black cherries and plums resonate in the mid palate leading to an interminable finish of rich, dark chocolate, kirsch and blackcurrants.
Still armed with exceptional power, depth and purity of fruit, this seductive vintage port with its characteristic Taylor understatement and restraint is still very youthful, with decades of potential ahead.
Anthony Gismondi, Wine Access