For anyone who loves fine wine and vintage port, this is both shockingly affordable and delicious.
From: Portugal
Although historical records mention Vesuvio as early as 1565, it was primarily under the auspices of the Douro's redoubtable widow, Dona Antónia Adelaide Ferreira, that this vineyard estate acquired its legendary reputation. The estate's industrious founder was her husband who from 1820 began the ambitious task of planting the vineyard.
This gargantuan enterprise involved shaping and constructing terraces on the intractable slopes of the region and planting hundreds of thousands of vines. This took his legions of workers thirteen years to complete. Following the founder's death, his widow continued to develop the property. Under her able management, Vesuvio became the showpiece quinta of the Douro.
At Vesuvio she built one of the Douro's largest wineries (at the time), containing eight granite 'lagares' (treading tanks) each capable of holding 25 pipes (1 pipe: 550 litres).
In 1989 Quinta do Vesuvio was purchased by the Symington family. Their involvement in the growing, production and shipping of Port began more than a century ago. The family decided from the outset to preserve the traditional character of the Quinta especially with regard to the vinification process where the time-honored method of treading the grapes by foot has been retained.
Some technological innovations have been introduced principally in the form of a cooling system to control fermentation in this ancient wine making method. In view of the outstanding quality of the wine, Vesuvio is offered exclusively as a single Quinta Vintage Port. Only about 50 pipes (36,000 bottles) are bottled each year, although the production of the property is much greater and this exemplifies the family's steadfast policy of releasing none but the very finest wines from the Quinta.
Tasting Notes: Peter Symington chose just 52 pipes from the Quinta's total production of 385 pipes to bottle as Quinta do Vesuvio 1995 Vintage Port. The wine is rich, dark and concentrated. It has aromas of violets and gum cistus and is very smooth and elegant in the mouth. The 1995 Vesuvio will rank as one of the Quinta's finest Vintages.
95 Points -Wine Enthusiast
