Taylor Sentinels 2024

The 2024 Sentinels Vintage Port represents the third release. It comes from different quintas to those that constitute the regular Taylor’s, namely Quinta da Casa Nova and Quinta da Eira Velha. It has an intriguing bouquet that takes time to cohere, eventually revealing quite enticing black plum, allspice, clove and subtle marine scents that gain intensity with aeration. The palate is very ripe and forward, one of the most decadent of the Vintage Ports, but I cannot help feeling that it just tips over into raisin/prune-like notes that render the finish a bit heady. Let’s see how it ages in bottle. 2030-2050.

A blend of fruit from five quintas in the Cima Corgo, including Terra Feita. TA 4.4 g/l, pH 3.64, RS 92 g/l. Total production 2,600 cases.Black core with blackcurrant rim. Pure, intense blackcurrant fruit with a whole layer of rocky Douro magic dust. Terrific fruit intensity and depth, peppery, too, freshness of tannins lifts all that generous fruit. Pure, fresh and long. Powerful but not heavy. Opens up to violets and and just a hint of mocha. I almost forgot to mention the tannins: extremely fine, dense and perfectly filled out by the fruit. Designed to be more approachable than the Taylor’s but still with ageing capacity of 40–60 years. By far the best and most concentrated of the Sentinels vintages so far. 2034 – 2065.

The third consecutive vintage of this wine which is a blend from four properties in the Pinhão Valley: Terra Feita, Junco, Eira Velha and Casa Nova. 2,600 cases in total. Wonderful colour with a lovely, pure fragrant open aromas, there’s an leafy woodland fruit freshness about this wine with lovely pure berry fruit, great definition with tight-knit, spicy tannins building in the mouth and leading to a long, linear finish which retains a nervy green edge. This is not a big wine but it is precise and supremely elegant, such that it can be drunk with pleasure now. It should develop well over the medium term (15-20 years).