Next port of call - Fortifieds close a winter dinner party like no other wine. Tony Love writes.

The Finishing touches for many mid-year meals are cheese and chocolate. And for good reason. They top the rich list when it comes to completing a big dinner party.

One of the most-asked questions at the Fnal act, however, is what to drink come the sweet times.

Cheeses can pose many options, given you could be dealing with hard, salty varieties through to ultra-smelly blues and creamily soft whites. Chocolate by the block can be an all sorts kind of question: milky smooth, or dark and grainy. Fancy fudges and Zumbo-like MasterChef creations deliver even more intense textures and flavours.

You need a pretty extraordinary wine to stand up to the magic of such happy culinary endings.

Enter one of the great Australian wine styles— Vintage Fortified. You might see them also badged simply as "VP". We used to know and love them as vintage ports, but international rulings on using place names stopped that.

Together with the loss of identity, fortified Australian wines have fallen from favour in a big way, perceived, perhaps, as too alcoholic for most folk. Such a shame, as this style of fortified, which is vastly different to the tawnies most people associate with the name "port", deserves so much more appreciation.

Despite a dwindling market, there's still a small band of winemaker devotees who love creating the style. Among them are Damien Tscharke, Troy Kalleske, Eric Semmler (919 Wines) as well as Chris and Jenny Pfeiffer, and many of the big-name producers who have maintained fortified stocks over the years.

Vintage fortified don't do long-barrel maturation such as tawnies, when the familiar nutty and caramel characters known as "rancio" can develop. Instead, using varieties like the Portuguese touriga nacional as well as shiraz, they are fortified with brandy spirit after a few days' fermentation when primary fruit sweetness is still evocative and compelling.

The wines are usually bottled within a year and show lifted dark berry juiciness, that often has a chocolate, licorice and fruit syrup-like sense in the drinking. This is why even the younger Barossa guns

such as Troy and Damien love it.

It still tells its varietal truths, Damien says. He uses touriga nacional without any oak influence in the grape or brandy.

"It still retains all those things people love in table wines, like primary fruit flavours and the signature of the variety," he says. Tawnies, while he still loves them, lose that primary fruit fingerprint for his palate. "VP is one of those wines that provide a sweet spot on everyone's palate, from the alcohol sweetness to the fruit," Damien says. "It delivers on all counts." He sips his with dark chocolate on cold winter nights, while Troy also suggests cheese, and sometimes as a partner to pate at the start of a meal.

But he does wonder why the wine isn't appreciated more.

"When you show people the wine, and explain how it works, they fall in love with it," Troy says.

"It's a really nice way to finish of a night."

Tony Love, The Advertiser, taste.com.au, 22nd June 2011