2012 Croft Quinta da Roeda

The 2012 Quinta da Roeda Port was bottled in 2014 and comes in at 103 grams per liter of residual sugar. Full-bodied and quite gripping on opening, it has a burnished, darker feel in flavor, plus good acidity. With air, it becomes far more elegant, seeming lighter in mouthfeel and quite graceful – but always with that serious backbone. Then, it shows off a certain silky texture (that seems to crop up a lot in this vintage) and it finishes with intensity of flavor. If it is not the most concentrated Port, it holds its own for the most part. By Day 3, it is in very fine balance, demonstrating power, the likelihood of future harmony and tasty fruit. It is a very nice effort in this vintage, although of the three Taylor Fladgate submissions this issue, it is the one that improved the least with a few days of aeration. It should still hold well for the foreseeable future. While it is probably the most approachable of the three submissions from the Taylor Fladgate group this issue, give it a few years to settle down for best results.