Fonseca Late Bottles Vintage Port & Cheese
The wines used to produce this Fonseca LBV were drawn from a reserve of some of the best full bodied red ports produced at the 2014 harvest, from grapes grown on Fonseca's own vineyards and on other top properties in the Cima Corgo and Douro Superior areas of the Douro.
Like vintage port, LBV is blended from wines of a single year. Whereas vintage port spends only two years in wood, LBV is aged in oak casks for between four and six years, hence the term ‘late bottled’.
Deep, purple, black colour, wonderful exuberance, overflowing with red currants, blackcurrants and loganberries.
Country: Portugal
Region: Douro Valley
Grape Variety: Old vines
Tasting Notes:
Wonderfully exuberant, pungent, full, aromatic nose. Luscious, ripe, black cherry and plum fruit with notes of cedar and spice. The wine is rich, rounded, concentrated, with layers juicy berry flavours and attractive notes of cedar. An elegant wine with good complexity and a lovely, intense finish full of flavour.
Cheese Characteristics:
LBV makes an excellent match for a goat’s milk cheese, such as a Caprino or Sainte-Maure. As the thick crumbly texture of the goat’s cheese dissolves in contact with the wine, the ripe and opulent fruitiness of the LBV merges with the rich tangy flavours of the cheese in a sublime synergy.
Valencay is a creamy, ash-coated truncated pyramid with a startling white pate. The texture is light and moussey and saltier than other Loire Valley goat’s cheeses. Young cheeses are delicate, and possess a floral, borderline citric taste, though after maturing the rind becomes drier and the taste levels out to a denser, more complex finish.
Sainte Maure is made from raw or pasteurised goat's milk, is produced mainly in Loire Valley in middle France. This buttery, smooth cheese with little acidic flavour emerges drier, denser, and a fine grey-blue edible rind.
Crottin De Chavignol is a light, moist and fluffy cheese, and a far cry from the hard and intense Crottins de Chavignol that are more suited to the French palate. From Affineur Rodolphe le Meunier.
Caprino cheese is so delicious we would recommend that it couldn’t taste better than on a spread, ready to be picked at on a warm day. Sometimes less is more, so all you need to show off the caprino is a good antipasti platter and LBV.
Castelo Branco has an interior pale, texture is semi soft, encased within a firmer, darker yellow rind. Flavours are tangy with a slightly spicy and sour finish.