Port anD the Douro 139Basket press
legislation of 1907 (see page 35), shippers were forced to purchase aguardente from outside
the region. Initially this came from distilleries in the Estremadura and the Ribatejo regions
of central-southern Portugal, but in the 1970s a greater proportion began to be sourced
abroad. It was accepted that the spirit should be of grape origin, 77% ABV and, ideally,
neutral in character. This is fundamentally different from the spirit used to fortify Sherry,
Madeira and the Australian fortifieds imitating Port which is 98% in strength.
There have been occasions where even the most basic standards were broken. Due to a
shortage of local aguardente, much of the widely declared 1904 vintage was fortified with
German spirit made from potato and grain, which led to it being dubbed the ‘schnapps
vintage’. More recently, the 1972, 1973 and 1974 vintages were fortified with industrial
alcohol of Yugoslavian origin, a well-documented scandal that was no fault of the shippers
and is related on page 48.
From 1967 until 1976, aguardente had to be purchased directly from the Casa do
Douro who were in turn supplied by the Junta Nacional do Vinho. When the Port Wine
Institute (IVP) subsequently assumed these powers, French spirit began to play a greater
role, but the shippers themselves still had little or no control over the quality of the
spirit used. It was only in 1991 – after the European Union forced liberalisation on
Portuguese government – that shippers began to take control. The shippers now buy spirit
individually with samples submitted to the IVDP for approval.
Since the late 1990s, a number of shippers have been experimenting with different
types of spirit for certain types of Port. Working with Lucien Bernard in Bordeaux, both
the Fladgate Partnership and Niepoort have been using a proportion of pot-distilled
spirits (some originating from Cognac) that have more character than the aguardentes
from continuous stills which have traditionally been used to fortify Port. It is fair to
conclude that the standard spirit used to fortify Port is not as neutral as everyone thought