Madeira wine comes from the island of Madeira (meaning wood) - the local language is Portuguese. Madeira is a fortified wine, meaning made stronger by adding alcohol.
Madeira is an island in the Atlantic. (As a child I could never remember which was the Atlantic and which was the Pacific. Kids - it's easy. If you grew up in England or Europe like me, your nearest ocean is the big Atlantic which Brunel's ships crossed to America. You leave the west coast of England to get to America's East coast.)
A for America, A for Atlantic. P for Pacific. The Film South Pacific was about Americans going the other way, from their west coast across the Pacific Ocean.
British boats sailed south from the Southern ports of Southampton and Portsmouth (and the Plymouth Brethren from Plymouth to America.
Wine went across the ocean from Europe to island stops, ocean 'stations' if you like, in places like Madeira which was Portuguese. Some of the wine got hot on the journey. And to prevent it going rancid they added extra alcohol.
The strong drink was very popular. It's too strong to drink large glasses of it all through the meal. (And too expensive.) You don't want to fall asleep during the meal. So you have just a little glass after the meal. If you fall asleep after the meal at bedtime, never mind.
The song, have some Madeira, M'dear, written and sung by Flanders and Swann, suggests an older man trying to get a naive young girl drunk - on what she probably doesn't realise is very strong drink. Twenty per cent alcohol! 20%!
Usual bottles of wine, alcohol by volume are under 15%. (Tax goes up after 15%. The tax is higher to stop people getting drunk on strong wine and to make more money for the government.)
Beer is average 4% so you can drink half a pint and feel merry. But a whole pint, unless you are very big and spend well over an hour drinking, is still going to affect your safety and your reaction in a test and means points on your driving license.
Look at the back of the bottle - how much alcohol content?
Older wines have a slightly lower alcohol content because of global warming. In years with cooler weather grapes make less sugar less alcohol. Alcohol is made from sugar.
Sweet wine is often low in alcohol, because the process is stopped earlier.
Wines were always fortified for a sea journey to stabilise them. Alcohol is neutral flavour. But unsold wine was sent back and had two sea crossings. So it was extra cooked in the journey. The heat changed it.
(Rutherglen Muscat from Australia also is warmed in the vilification process.
But with sherry is kept cool in well ventilated lodges where it is stored. Port is also kept cool. A different drink.
Wine is kept in wine fridges to stop it changing in the heat. So you keep wines in a cool cellar.
In London sometimes if you go into the big Berry's shop at 3, St James Street, a wine shop near the Ritz hotel in Piccadilly, you will sometimes be able to taste a thimbleful of Madeira. I once tried Madeira, Port and Sherry to see the difference.
Anybody can compare three drinks at home. Set up three bottles and three glasses per person. You can hide the bottles. To make sure you don't forget, or move the bottles, or move the glasses, or find the family arguing and ending up doing it all over again, follow a system used by the regular wine tasting groups. Label the wine stem with stickers of different colours and letters of the alphabet to match sticker bottles. Put a pencil and paper for each person to make notes while they 'drink blind' (not knowing what you are drinking). Pour. Taste. Evaluate. You will soon decide which you prefer.
Which is better? That's like asking whether strawberries are better than raspberries. Some people prefer one, some prefer another. The wine taste, and your taste or preference, may change according to the occasion, time of day, the food, the mood, and so on.
A member of my family is taking the WSET course. (Wine and Spirits Education Trust.) So we are doing comparisons. (Tasters spit the wine out.)
The photo above shows ten and fifteen year old Madeira wines.
Apparently, the Madeira wine is exported more to France than any other country. We have been asking why this is, every time we find a Portuguese waiter in a Portuguese, Spanish or Italian restaurant, but nobody seems to know why. Recently we asked Pedro in Loch Fyne in Norwich. He mentioned that Madeira is used to pickle fish, such as herring.
Labels
If you want to do a comparison of different types of Madeira, or sherry, Port and Madeira, by searching the web I'm uploading some of what I've found, the following prices:
amazon.com
Morrisons from about £10.
Tesco cases of £72, equivalent of £72 a bottle.
starchefs.com/wine/feature/html/madeira
madeira wine.com redirects to
madeira-shopping.com also sells Madeira products such as biscuits and brandy
If you want to know more read The Wines of Madeira by Trevor Elliott.
Angela Lansbury
Travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. I have several more posts on Madeira, the island, and Madeira wine. Please share links to your favourite posts.
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