How to Identify Different Types of Port

Port is a fortified dessert wine from Portugal and is world renowned for its complexity and robust flavors. There are ten different types of port and they can be confusing if you don't know a little bit about them before you start tasting. Learn a little more about the most popular and readily available types.

Things You'll Need

• 1 bottle ruby port
• 1 bottle young tawny port
• 1 bottle aged tawny port
• 1 bottle vintage port
• 1 bottle LBV port

Instructions

1. Taste and understand ruby port. This is the youngest and least expensive of all ports. It is made from grapes in the western Duoro region of Portugal and are only aged for three years. Ruby port can be delicious and fruity and is great for use in cocktails as well. Pour a bit of ruby port into the port glass and smell. You will get scents of ripe cherry and even oak. Taste it and you will discover baked cherry flavors mingling with an underlying citrus burst of candied orange peel.

2. Taste and understand young tawny port. These ports are made from the same grapes that ruby port is made from, and are also aged for two to three years. This port, however, tends to be lighter in color than ruby port, and is also a little less fruit forward. Pour and smell the young tawny and you will most likely get the scent of light brown sugar. You should taste more simple notes of sweetness like barley sugar and honey.

3. Taste and understand aged tawny port. These are tawny's that are blended with several vintages and aged anywhere between five to forty years in barrel before release. Because of this, they are much darker in color than young tawny ports. These are ports of incredible sophistication and grace and have amazing character on the nose and palate. Pour and smell the aged tawny and take in the vanilla and oak notes. Hazelnut and caramel will be dominant notes with a lingering smoky background.

4. Taste and understand vintage port. Vintage port is only made from the best grapes (usually from the eastern Duoro region) and only in very, very good years. They are aged two years in barrel, then bottled with sediment to be aged indefinitely. When you serve a vintage port, decant it first to leave off any sediment at the bottom of the bottle. The smell from a vintage port can be as varied as black cherry and vanilla to cedar and burnt sugar. On the palate, vintage ports are power-houses of flavor, bringing across almond, chocolate, coffee and butterscotch notes.

5. Taste and understand late bottle vintage port. Late bottle vintage port, or LBV, is made up of one vintage, aged four to six years and bottled without its sediment. They are sold as ready to drink, that is to say, unlike vintage ports, they will gain nothing from extended aging. They are also made every year, as opposed to in just the very good years, like vintage ports. Pour and smell this port. You will get very similar notes to that which you experienced with the vintage port, only less intense. You will experience light cocoa notes and baked red fruit flavors, with less intensity than that of the vintage port.

Tips & Warnings

• Other types of port that are less common include white port, vintage character port, traditional late bottle vintage port, single quinta vintage port, crusted port, and garrafeira port.