Smith Woodhouse Vintage Port 2011
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Smith Woodhouse 2011 Vintage Port pairs wonderfully with chocolate desserts, such as chocolate mousse, creamy blue cheeses like Stilton or Roquefort.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
Offers an aroma of violet, with powerful, concentrated and refined flavors of raspberry, kirsch, blueberry and spice. Lengthens out midpalate, showing fine grip and a luscious finish filled with cream, hazelnut and chocolate notes. Best from 2030 through 2060.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Perpetually underrated, the 2011 Smith Woodhouse, which is founded upon very old vines at Quinta da Madalena in the Torto Valley, has a broody but intense bouquet of blackberry, kirsch, Oriental spices and a slight resinous note. It is very well-defined – but serious. The palate is medium-bodied with supple tannins, fine acidity, and a lovely spice note at the side of the mouth that leaves the mouth tingling long after it has departed. Very harmonious and long, this is a wonderful Smith Woodhouse. Excellent.
Range: 92-94 -
James Suckling
A young vintage Port with an earthy and spicy character. Full body, very sweet with round and chewy tannins and a fruity finish. Serious intensity. Try in 2021.
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2016-
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Port is a sweet, fortified wine with numerous styles: Ruby, Tawny, Vintage, Late Bottled Vintage (LBV), White, Colheita, and a few unusual others. It is blended from from the most important red grapes of the Douro Valley, based primarily on Touriga Nacional with over 80 other varieties approved for use. Most Ports are best served slightly chilled at around 55-65°F.
The home of Port—perhaps the most internationally acclaimed beverage—the Douro region of Portugal is one of the world’s oldest delimited wine regions, established in 1756. The vineyards of the Douro, set on the slopes surrounding the Douro River (known as the Duero in Spain), are incredibly steep, necessitating the use of terracing and thus, manual vineyard management as well as harvesting. The Douro's best sites, rare outcroppings of Cambrian schist, are reserved for vineyards that yield high quality Port.
While more than 100 indigenous varieties are approved for wine production in the Douro, there are five primary grapes that make up most Port and the region's excellent, though less known, red table wines. Touriga Nacional is the finest of these, prized for its deep color, tannins and floral aromatics. Tinta Roriz (Spain's Tempranillo) adds bright acidity and red fruit flavors. Touriga Franca shows great persistence of fruit and Tinta Barroca helps round out the blend with its supple texture. Tinta Cão, a fine but low-yielding variety, is now rarely planted but still highly valued for its ability to produce excellent, complex wines.
White wines, generally crisp, mineral-driven blends of Arinto, Viosinho, Gouveio, Malvasia Fina and an assortment of other rare but local varieties, are produced in small quantities but worth noting.
With hot summers and cool, wet winters, the Duoro has a maritime climate.