Fun While it Lasted!
After our evening on Portuguese wines, in May 2019, member and friend, Alan Wainwright started ordering direct from Portugal Vineyards fairly regularly for himself and Annie, the Pharaohs, and Peter and me. We were able to enjoy excellent value and stocked up on assorted wines including some of the Offley Rosé Port we had on that evening. We even had a go at random sampling of some of the more expensive wines, sometimes choosing for the distinctly dubious reason that their labels featured pictures of a bird! Some were better than others. I personally am still enjoying the Porta 6 red wine as a reliable light-weight red. The photo shows some of our remaining bottles.
Sadly, post-Brexit, those wines, which were costing us about £4 per bottle, will now cost about the same as in any supermarket here. Portugal Vineyards explained:
“The wines are subject to excise duty and for wines up to 15% alcohol volume it’s £2.23 per bottle of 750ml. Sparkling wines have a different excise, it should be £2.86 per bottle of 750ml. For a fortified wine such as a Port Wine it is £2.97 per bottle of 750ml.”
Ah well, it was fun while it lasted!
Thinking of food pairing, we have enjoyed some Maison Bleue Léa takeaway meals. The Xavier Santana Muscatel went brilliantly with their Fig Panna Cotta, so much so that unusually for me I had the same dessert twice in a row. But I’m afraid you cannot test this yourself because the Panna Cotta is no longer on their menu.
Finally, I keep a five year diary and read back from previous years each day as I write. I cannot help noticing that periodically the standard of my handwriting deteriorated markedly; this always happened on WSFWS evenings. I do hope it is not too long before this happens again!