Any Port in a storm...

[gremlin]

Why is the Port we drink today sweet and not dry? I'm told that the origins of Port lay in the Napoleonic wars. Supplies of red wine from our usual retailer were cruelly interrupted while we shot at each other with musket and cannon. Gasping for a glass of red we looked to our friends in Portugal. Unfortunately theirs did not travel too well. So some bright spark who had bought the remaining stock chucked in some brandy hoping no one would notice. True? If so, the original Port would have been made with dry red wine. The Port we enjoy today is sweet. The fermentation is stopped prematurely by adding spirit, the grape sugars that remain provide the sweetness. If this is the case, then why, when and how did the change in style come about?

[Pinotage]

The change to adding brandy during fermentation, rather than afterwards, came quite soon and the resulting wines were much more popular. An English merchant found a Portuguese monastery that added brandy to halt fermentation, liked what he tasted and copied the process and soon everyone was doing it .

 

The market decided :)

[archbishop]

Try White Port. It isn't sweet.