Winemaker Notes
The intense red tawny color with shades of brick, typical of this style of aged yet youthful wine, anticipates the elegant and complex aroma, combining ripe fruit, jam and nuts, with hints of vanilla and raisins. In the mouth, Sandeman Tawny 10 Years Old is a most flavorsome wine, full-bodied and appealing, with a persistent finish.
Professional Ratings
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Decanter
Deep hue. Marked fresh red fruit, almost vinous aromas. Big and bold with brooding dried fruit and a dark chocolate finish.
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James Suckling
Dried fruit, bark, and burnt orange aromas follow through to a medium body, medium-sweet palate with more dried fruits, and an earthy finish. Fruitier style. Drink now.
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Wine Spectator
Rich and supple, offering creamy flavors of hazelnut, Christmas pudding and ripe cherry, with cocoa powder notes. Lush and spicy on the long, ripe finish.
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Wine Enthusiast
The youngest in the great range of Sandeman aged tawnies, this 10-year-old brings out fruit as well as wood flavors. That gives the wine freshness to balance its natural richness, spice and fine acidity. Dried fruits come through at the end. The wine is, like all aged tawnies, ready to drink.
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Wine & Spirits
The color falls at the intersection of tawny and ruby, pointing to the freshness that's apparent in the taste of the wine. The youthful fruit character lasts beyond substantial tannins, balancing the wine with density, firmness and length. A substantive 10-Year-Old to serve with a savory pear and almond tart.
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Wilfred Wong of Wine.com
One has to like the fieriness in the Sandeman 10 Year Old Tawny Porto. I know I do. This wine delivers a sharp edge, along with its sweetness, and bright fruitiness. While the tawny character is present in the background, the zippy, red fruitiness stays long into the finish. This Port is an excellent choice with poached pears and a healthy dab of blue cheese on the side. (Tasted: October 27, 2016, San Francisco, CA)
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. To learn more, see our full Port Wine Guide
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.