96

Quinta do Noval Vintage Port 2018 (96 JD)

The 2018 Vintage Port is fabulous stuff and has a quintessential bouquet of spiced berries, cassis, fresh plum, Asian spices, and dried flowers. More about elegance, finesse, and complexity than sheer power (especially when compared to the 2020s), it’s medium to full-bodied and nicely focused on the palate, with perfect balance between its fruit, sugar, and alcohol. Brought up in old wood tanks and bottled with 100 grams of residual sugar, it already offers pleasure, particularly with lots of air (I followed this bottle for three days), but I suspect it will have 40 years or more of overall longevity given its remarkable purity and balance.” J.D 2/23

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    Quinta do Noval

    Quinta do Noval Vintage Port 2018

    Douro Valley, Portugal

    Quinta do Noval Vintage Port is characterized by its purity of fruit and a fine and delicate quality that is typical of the wines of the property in general but which finds its most remarkable and enduring expression in the Vintage Ports. Equilibrium, harmony, finesse and elegance characterize these great Vintage Ports. Unlike other Port houses, Noval produces a Vintage Port every year using only a very strict selection of the very best lots, the quantity produced varying accordingly. It is made exclusively from grapes from the Quinta, in the heart of the Douro Valley. The wines selected for the Quinta do Noval Vintage Port blend represent only a small proportion of the total production.

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    Quinta do Noval

    Douro Valley, Portugal

    One of the oldest port houses, Quinta do Noval is also arguably the greatest. It is unique among top port houses in that most of the ports are made from estate-grown fruit and, notably, all of the vintage Noval wines are from the single Quinta do Noval vineyard.