Wine & Spirits - June 2019 - 11

2017 Porto
Vintage Port declarations are not an annual occurrence. Historically, the
leading houses declare about three Vintages in a decade, bottling the top
sliver of their production instead of aging it to Tawny in cask. The great
Vintages are among the world's most long-lived wines.
Loath to saturate the market or erode the prestige of their brands,
shippers have held to established traditions in Porto, at least when it comes
to declaring a Vintage. Some, like the Fladgate Partnership, which produces
Taylor Fladgate, Fonseca and Croft, wait to announce their decision until St.
George's Day (April 23rd). However, two significant players-Quinta do Noval
and Symington Family Estates-no longer follow that particular tradition and
declared the Vintage on April 9, 2019.
By all accounts, 2017 is an unusual year. According to Charles
Symington, who directs winemaking for the Symington's brands, including
Graham's, Dow's, Cockburn's, Warre's, Smith Woodhouse and Quinta do
Vesuvio, 2017 is the first time his family has declared back-to-back vintages,
and the first time his family has picked Port wine grapes in August. Unlike
2016, which benefited from a rainy winter that built up water reserves in
the soil, the winter leading into 2017 was dry, and those drought conditions
continued through the entire season. Symington described how the Douro's
dry-farmed vines handled the lack of available water, reporting that "the
size of the canopy was small, the bunches small and the berries small. The
amount of fruit the vine had to maintain was small, and the overall structure
of the vine didn't require as much water." While June 2017 was the hottest
on record, the temperatures moderated later in the season. "Summer was
below average in temperature, and though we had a little more than half
the average annual rainfall, the rain that did fall was actually useful-a
lighter, constant rain, it didn't all run off into the river." Symington points
out that the entire cycle of the vines shifted, with an early bud break (end

of February),
early flowering
(beginning of May)
and early veraison
(end of June). "You
can often have
early budburst, but
usually something
will slow down the
cycle and things
will normalize. We
ended up starting
MALVEDOS
the vintage on the
28th of August.
If you think back in the mid-twentieth century, it was normal to start at the
beginning of October. In the last 50 years, it's been mid-September for red
grapes. We finished the vintage at Malvedos on the 15th of September, a
usual date for starting the vintage. It wasn't that the cycle was shorter; the
cycle was shifted."
Vintage reports from the leading shippers describe yields down 20
percent from 2016, which was already a small harvest. Old vines with their
deep roots, and north-facing sites protected from the full intensity of the sun,
may have weathered the vintage best.
Christian Seely, who heads up AXA Millésimes and Quinta do Noval,
described the concentration of the 2017 vintage and, like Symington,
compared it to 1945, another concentrated year with an early growing cycle.
Leaving off the exuberant prose of Noval's press release, Seely ended an
email exchange simply: "It is very good." -JOSHUA GREENE

NYC: HUNKY DORY

photo of Malvedos coutresy of W&J Graham's

Claire Sprouse runs this gathering spot in Crown Heights, Brooklyn,
a sunshine-filled hangout during the day that morphs into a cocktail
bar at night. Sprouse consults for others, too, focusing on sustainable
practices and environmentally conscious bartending; at her own place,
she creates drinks with eco-friendly spirits and local produce. Chef Kirstyn
Brewer follows her lead, reaching for local mackerel for the escabeche
and repurposing Milk Punch for the Onion Dip & Chips. Those chips pair
well with the Golden Year, a Sprouse cocktail featuring sunflower seeds,
Bourbon, Cynar and lemon. -R.D.T.
Hunky Dory, 747 Franklin Ave., Brooklyn, NY; hunkydorybk.com, 516-418-2063

SOMERVILLE, MA: REBEL REBEL
The chalkboard by-the-glass selection at Rebel Rebel may change over
the course of a few hours-and that's exactly how owner Lauren Friel
likes it. She will pull the cork and sell a glass from nearly any of the
30-some bottles on the shelves lining the bar, all of them low-input and
sustainably made. Friel also runs VinDrop, the consulting business that
built the all-female wine list at Dirt Candy in New York City; several times
a month, she invites like-minded winemakers such as Alex Krause of
Birichino in Santa Cruz and Matteo Furlani from Italy's Dolomites to take
over the chalkboard and mingle with guests. -JEANNE O'BRIEN COFFEY
Rebel Rebel, 1 Bow Market Way, Somerville, MA; rebelrebelsomerville.com

WINE & SPIRITS

JUNE 2019

11
http://www.hunkydorybk.com http://www.rebelrebelsomerville.com
Wine & Spirits - June 2019

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