Sweet Finish: Dessert & Fortified Wines

There are at least six ways to get sugar into a finished wine, and they produce six completely different drinks. Stop the fermentation early. Dry the grapes in the sun until they are raisins. Add spirit mid-ferment and strand the sugar where it sits. Leave it in a barrel for a decade and let evaporation do the work. We pour one of each, in order of intensity, and by the end you will know which style you actually like rather than filing them all under sweet. Pours are small here and so are many of the bottles, which is exactly why this category makes such good presents. The last class before Christmas. Every bottle we pour is on the shelf when we finish and the gift table will be set up by the time we are done. Three ports at three price points solves your father-in-law in about four minutes.