Tawny Wine

Tawny Wine or Tawny Port is a style of Port Wine named for its golden brown colouring. Tawny Ports are a blend of different wines, as opposed to a Vintage Port which is made from at least 95% of a single vintage. This makes Tawny Ports far more accessible and able to be drunk soon after bottling. This doesn’t mean that a Tawny is quick to make, as they are aged in the barrel, usually for from 5 to 12 years.

A Tawny Port can be made from white grape varieties but the oxidization process will give it a ‘tawny’ colour anyway. This is caused by its exposure to oxygen in a similar manner to Sherry. Tawny Ports are also usually made with the Solera system in which older barrels are constantly topped up from younger ones, a process aided by the Tawny Port being kept at higher than usual temperatures so that a fair amount of evaporation takes place. This reduction is what also gives a Tawny Port its relatively ‘syrupy’ feel.

Because Tawny Ports are aged in the barrel they are relatively stable wines and so can often be kept for quite a long time after opening. This is not the case with Vintage Ports which may have been in the barrel for much shorter periods and aged in an oxygen free bottle for much longer. The impact on a Vintage Port of being opened and therefore exposed to oxygen, is very much greater.

Perhaps the most celebrated Tawny Port in Australia is the Penfolds Grandfather Port, the origin of which goes back to 1915 when an oak cask of the best Tawny Port was put aside for the exclusive use of the Penfold family. This became known as ‘the Grandfather’ due to the great age of the oldest Tawnies in the blend created of course using the Solera system. Today’s Penfolds Grandfather Liqueur Tawny, follows in this tradition and is a blend of the best Tawnies aged in oak casks.

Another great example of an Australian Tawny is the Seppelt D.P. 90 Barossa Valley Tawny. The wine is made from Grenache and Shiraz vines in the Barossa Valley to produce a much awarded wine, having won 14 Trophies and 59 Gold Medals in Australian wine shows since 1990.

Seppelt also produces the Seppeltsfield Para Grand Tawny, made from a blend of Grenache, Shiraz and Mourvedre varieties from the Barossa Valley wine region of South Australia. Named after the Para River, which runs through Barossa Valley, the Para began to find its way into the hearts of Port lovers in 1953. Matured with the traditional Solera system, it also comes in a distinctive bottle shape that makes it easily recognised.

Not to be neglected is the Penfolds Bluestone 10 Year Old Tawny Port, also created by fruit from the Barossa Valley of South Australia. Penfolds is one of Australia’s oldest winemakers and for all of that time the making of Port wines has been part of that history, ever since Dr Christopher Rawson Penfold planted his first vines in 1844. The Penfolds Bluestone 10 Year Old Tawny is also a blend of Grenache, Shiraz and Mourvedre varieties. These individual varieties are aged separately in oak casks for up to ten years before being blended into this great Fortified wine.

While various Port wines were of great popularity in the past, the previous century has seen a steep decline in their consumption. Indeed wines such as Marsala, Madeira and even Sherry are now days rarely drunk at all. This staggering change in tastes was partly the result of the increased consumption of table wines, but can no doubt also be attributed to a fall in quality that damaged the reputation of this type of wine greatly. Perhaps only in the last 2-3 decades have producers reversed this quality decline and as a result the consumption of Ports is once again beginning to rise.

Another factor that works against the consumption of a good Port is that these are much more complex offerings than the majority of table wines. Their intensity and subtleness, not to mention their strength, demands a certain sense of time if they are to be appreciated. The modern world is not one in which time and tranquility are given high priority.