Taylor's : Single Harvest 1896 Crystal Carafe Limited Edition 1896

This is very intense, with burnt brown sugar, toffee, caramel, treacle tart and volatile notes. Burnt orange peel, too. Hint of turpentine, but it’s no bother. It’s full-bodied, very sweet and dense like molasses, but it remains liquid and lightly syrupy. The finish is intense and powerful with a light acetone note to the caramel character. It was aged 125 years in cask in a forgotten cellar in the Douro Valley and bottled in 2021. A tiny-production, uniquely historical fortified wine. Drink now.

From the stock acquired when The Fladgate Partnership bought tawny specialists Wiese & Krohn. Launched in 2021 during COVID-19. Almost all sold. Dark brownish green. Very ancient nose smelling of bracken. Really very syrupy. High-toned and then a lot of acid that makes it rather painful to taste. A slight caramel note. More of a relic than a wine, really. Drink dates are highly speculative! (JR)

(of the 50 barriques laid down in 1896, only 2 barriques of 600 liters remain due to evaporation, CHF 4,500.-) Dense, complex, finely creamy, peppery, powerful bouquet: prunes, damsons, Ricola, pear syrup, cedar, graphite, walnuts, roasted almonds, dark caramel, dried figs, black tea smoke, graphite and many other aromas. Multi-layered, creamy, powerful palate with a concentrated structure, delicate sweetness, intense and superb aromatics, plenty of fine extract, well-integrated alcohol, and a very long, powerful finish with many sweet retro-olfactory notes. 20/20 to drink