Fortified Wines

A Fortified wine is simply a wine produced in the usual manner of most table wines, but one into which a certain amount of alcohol has been added. It is thus a wine that has been ‘fortified’ in the sense of being made stronger in alcohol (‘fortis’ being the Latin for ‘strong’). Most of the common fortified names such as Port, Sherry or Madeira are fortified wines named more or less after their places of origin. Nowadays this means such names, as with Champagne in the Sparkling wines, cannot be used by those from other places who adopted the same methods.

In Australia fortified wines are either named after a grape, as with Muscat’s made from the Muscatel grape, or are described as Tawny or Vintage Ports. In addition, Australia also makes a range of fortified White Wines that are more variously named. In the United States Fortified wines are usually known as Dessert wines.

The making of Fortified wines has a long history in Australia, and in fact, while it may be hard to believe today, Fortifieds out produced table wines until the great wine boom of the 1980s transformed the Australian wine industry. This was partly a matter of taste but was also based on the fact that with shipping times in terms of months, it was the Fortifieds that could best survive the trip to the then main market for Australian produce - England.

In general Fortified wines are made from grapes with a high sugar content, they are then crushed and fermented in such a way as to ensure the maximum colour and tannins are extracted. At a certain point in the fermentation process a spirit of around 80% alcohol by volume is added, a procedure that kills the yeast and stops the fermentation. This halting of the fermentation also means less sugar is consumed by the yeast and is the reason many Fortifieds are relatively sweet. For a drier style the adding of the spirit is delayed, as in a dry Sherry. The style and flavour of the final product is not only due to the base wine but also the spirit that is added contributes greatly to the wine. A brandy spirit, itself made from grapes, is often used, though spirits derived from sugarcane and other sugar sources are also common.

The difference between a spirit such as a brandy and a fortified wine is of course that the former is the result of distillation rather than fermentation.

The original Fortified wines are of course Port from Portugal and Sherry from Jerez in Spain, while Madeira comes from the island of Madeira off the coast of Portugal. Madeira is created using a special winemaking process known as ‘estufagem’ or heating. In this process, after the wine has undergone fermentation and been fortified, the wine is placed in oak barrels. These barrels are then slowly heated to reach a temperature of approx 45°C and kept at this level for up to three months. The wine is then allowed to slowly cool.

Jerez or Sherry on the other hand is produced by not completely filling the oak barrel into which the wine is placed. As a result a layer of yeast called ‘flor’ is formed, the growth and death of which does much to influence the flavour of the wine. This wine is also subjected to the Solera system, meaning that only part of a barrel is drawn off for bottling and the barrel replenished from the wine of a younger barrel, which in turn is replenished from a still younger one and so on. The result is that the wine that is bottled can contain at least a small amount of very old wine indeed.

Ports are generally of two kinds, Tawny Ports and Vintage Ports. The difference is that that Tawny Ports are usually made by blending a number of wines, while Vintage Port, as the name suggests, is made predominantly from a single variety, usually at least 95%. Tawny Ports can be consumed soon after bottling while Vintage Ports will often improve with age.

Fortified wines are wines that are aged for many years, and this resulted in many traditions evolving during the years of the popularity of drinking Port after a meal. For example, it was usual to ‘slide’ a bottle of Port from person to person around a table rather than lifting it. This was in order not to disturb the sediments that had settled in the bottom of the bottle. Similarly a Port was often opened by snapping its neck, using specially heated pliers, rather than attempting to remove a cork that was likely to have deteriorated with time.

While such finicky ceremonies are a thing of the past, thankfully the high quality of Fortified wines is not. Today’s Fortified wines, be they Ports, Muscats or one of Australia’s fine Fortified Whites, are as wonderful to drink as they ever were. While the dominance of table reds and whites looks set to remain, the appreciation of a good Fortified wine is something we can all enjoy.