2009 Niepoort declaration and Niepoort tasting today

1 Jul 2011

Table wines and 2009 vintage port on tasting from midday

With Dirk Niepoort between 12 & 1pm

Dirk Niepoort had an inauspicious start to his table-wine making career. His father disapproved of this diversion from port-wine making and, while Dirk was away, he gave two of the three barrels of Dirk's first wine to his workers to drink. Today we shan't be tasting 1990 Robustus.

Two decades on and much has changed. Several dozen port shippers have become just 5 conglomerates. Only three independents survive, and only one of them thrives. Niepoort has emerged not only as the driving force behind the dynamic table wine industry of the Douro but also - arguably - as its best vintage port maker.

Maverick, contentious, erudite and certainly unconventional, Dirk Niepoort is the man who has achieved the remarkable transformation of this once traditional port house. Dirk is a big fan of Burgundy and his wines somehow seem to convey this fact. Perhaps it's part of the reason why, over the past decade, his wines have come to dominate both our port and Douro table wine ranges. On our recent trip to see him, we also found that Dirk is highly gregarious. He joins us today between midday and 1pm to introduce a tasting of some of his table wines as well as his eagerly awaited 2009 vintage port. /AR

'Niepoort 2009 is massive in every way but so beautifully complete and integrated. More flesh than the tannic 2007 but the power and structure are all there; rich, sustained, mouthfilling and very long indeed. 18 points.' - Julia Harding, Robert Parker, jancisrobinson.com, May 2011

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