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America turns 250 on Saturday. A quarter of a millennium. By European standards, 250 years is practically yesterday. But here in America? A pretty big birthday. And cause for a pretty big celebration. There will be fireworks, parades, and a truly heroic amount of toasting going on. And if you want to toast with something both genuinely delicious and historically accurate, skip the beer and rosé, and pour something the Founding Fathers would actually recognize.

If the American Revolution had a sponsor, it would have been Madeira. And it’s the most patriotic thing you can put in a glass. Stay with me.

Madeira is a fortified wine, which means that a spirit (usually brandy), is added during production. It comes from the Portuguese island of the same name, a tiny volcanic speck in the Atlantic Ocean about 600 miles southwest of mainland Portugal. Madeira is special in that it is intentionally heated (maderization) and deliberately exposed to oxygen during aging, which makes it virtually indestructible. It’s one of the most age-worthy wines on the planet. And, like Champagne, Madeira can only be made in Madeira.

Most wines hated crossing the Atlantic in the Age of Sail – the trip ruined regular wines. But not Madeira. Madeira arrived tasting better. All that heat and sloshing around actually improved the wine. Most wines considered the trip abuse. Madeira called it finishing school.

And of course, I have a map for you. 🌎

It’s kind of astonishing grapes can even grow on Madeira – it’s humid, subtropical, and genuinely hostile to winemaking. Growers plant their vines near the tops of the mountains, at elevations between 600 and 1,300 feet. The sheer cliff faces make cultivation nearly impossible, so farmers built an intricate system of terraces to work around it. Because machines can’t reach the vineyards, workers harvest every grape by hand.

It’s a wonder they didn’t rip out the vines in favor of bananas and call it a day.

Sidebar: If you have ever worked a harvest picking grapes by hand, you know this is soul-sucking, backbreaking work. A couple of years ago, I helped with a friend’s harvest, and picked grapes by hand for a couple of hours. And then I threw up the white flag of surrender. Those were two of the most un-fun hours of my life.

Madeira: The Toast of Colonial America

Madeira was wildly popular during America’s formative years. American colonists didn’t just like Madeira – they were obsessed with it.

There was no American wine industry during the American Revolution. We were totally dependent on wine imports from Britain. If you wanted to drink Bordeaux or Champagne, you could, but you’d have to pay a hefty tax, which made wine only accessible to the wealthy.

Because of an infuriating set of rules called the Navigation Laws, goods coming into the colonies could only come via British ships, and they had to originate in British ports of call.  However, when British King Charles II married a Portuguese princess in 1661, he handed Madeira a significant gift: direct sales to any British colony in the world.

Hello, loophole!

So, early Americans drank Madeira patriotically – it was delicious, and every bottle they poured was one less tax paid to the Crown.

Madeira also survived the American climate in a way French wines simply couldn’t. Because producers had already heated and oxidized Madeira during production, a summer spent baking on a shelf in the hot, humid American South didn’t ruin it the way it would Bordeaux or Champagne.

By the mid-1700s, Americans were buying so much Madeira that some historians estimate they consumed as much as 95% of the island’s annual production. It wasn’t just a favorite wine – it was the wine of colonial America.

Madeira’s Resume

• Successfully started a riot three years before the Boston Tea Party: British customs seized John Hancock’s ship, Liberty, in Boston Harbor in 1768 over a smuggled shipment of Madeira. That incident sparked riots and protests that directly foreshadowed the Boston Tea Party. (Fun fact: The young lawyer who defended John Hancock against the British customs charges? John Adams.)
• Selected as the official beverage for celebrating American independence: The Founding Fathers used Madeira to toast the Declaration of Independence in 1776.
• Assisted with the creation of the first American flag: Tradition holds that Betsy Ross sipped Madeira while sewing the Stars and Stripes.
• Provided stress management services to the Continental Congress: Writing to Abigail Adams, John Adams admitted, “I drink Madeira at a great rate.” 
• Catered the Constitutional Convention after-party: A few days before the official signing of the U.S. Constitution in 1787, fifty-five delegates gathered at Philadelphia’s City Tavern and polished off 54 bottles of Madeira (along with a heroic quantity of everything else). It’s a wonder any of them could still sign their names the next morning.
• Served as George Washington’s preferred nightcap: Washington drank three to five glasses of Madeira each evening, and on the day before he died, his household sent an urgent letter to a Madeiran wine importer requesting a pipe of superior quality Madeira for the General. The man had his priorities.
• Chosen as the official entertaining wine of Jefferson’s first presidency: During his first year in office, Thomas Jefferson ordered roughly 3,500 bottles of Madeira for presidential entertaining and official functions. He later toasted with Madeira when the decision was made to locate the US Capitol in Washington.
• Inspired America’s national anthem (allegedly): Legend has it Francis Scott Key was drinking Madeira while composing The Star-Spangled Banner.

That’s some pedigree.

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Madeira survived everything history could throw at it. Over the next seventy years, the island endured one disaster after another – disease, war, changing trade routes, more disease, and finally Prohibition. Unfortunately, it turns out wines may be indestructible – but wine industries aren’t.

In 1851, oidium, a powdery mildew fungus, arrived on the island and decimated yields. The American Civil War slammed the southern market shut entirely. The opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 rerouted shipping away from Madeira, dealing another blow. Phylloxera, the microscopic vine-destroying bug, arrived in 1872 and took out what was left. And then, as if the island hadn’t suffered enough, Prohibition closed Madeira’s oldest and most important market for good.

At the time of the American Revolution, there were two dozen producers making Madeira.

Today, just eight remain.

Styles of Madeira

Across every level of sweetness, Madeira carries a searing, high acidity as its hallmark. And the label tells you exactly where on sweetness spectrum you’re standing.

Most inexpensive Madeira – including virtually everything at the grocery store – is made from Tinta Negra Mole. If the label doesn’t name a grape, that’s what’s in the bottle.

The very best Madeiras come from one of four white grapes: Sercial, Verdelho, Bual, and Malmsey. Conveniently, the grape names are also the names used to designate the style of Madeira.

The traditional progression from driest to sweetest is: Sercial → Verdelho → Bual → Malmsey.

Sercial 

This is the driest style. Pale amber in color. Tangy, almost salty flavors of almond, hazelnut, honey, and hay. Think: aperitif.

Verdelho 

A medium dry style. Amberish in color. Fuller bodied than Sercial, with bitter orange, apricot, mango, cashew, and caramel flavors. Very food-friendly style.

Bual 

A semi-sweet style. Deep amber in color. Very concentrated and rich, full body. Orange, apricot, golden raisin, fig, date, walnuts, pecan, toffee, coffee, burnt sugar. Rich enough to sip on its own, but still balanced by Madeira’s signature acidity. This is my favorite style of Madeira.

Malvasia/Malmsey 

The richest, sweetest style. Deep brown in color. Flavors of toffee, figs, roasted pecans, orange peel, and baking spices. It’s the classic dessert Madeira – and the bottle many people fall in love with.

So, if you’re looking for an authentic patriotic beverage to toast America’s 250th birthday, look to the original patriot, Madeira.

How and Where to Buy Madeira

Most grocery store Madeira is terrible. If you’ve only had the $10 bottle sitting next to the dusty bottle of cooking sherry (side eye: anything from Taylor’s), you haven’t really experienced Madeira. That’s like deciding you don’t like wine because you don’t like White Zinfandel.

The Broadbent lineup of Madeiras are widely available and very good. Expect to spend around $40–50 per bottle. Again, in order from driest to sweetest:

Sercial → Verdelho → Bual → Malmsey. 

If you’re looking for something a little more unique/special, The Rare Wine Company’s Historic Series is worth a detour. Each wine in the collection is named after an American city where Madeira was a staple in the 18th and 19th centuries, and the styles aren’t random. Charleston Sercial and Savannah Verdelho nod to the South’s preference for drier styles, while Boston Bual and New York Malmsey tip the hat to the North’s taste for something richer and sweeter.

History in a bottle, basically.

I have the full collection and while I love them all, the Boston Bual is my favorite.

I’ll wrap-up with the best description I’ve ever read about madeira:

Madeira is the vinous equivalent of Cirque du Soleil, complete with fireworks and acrobatics.
~ Tamlyn Currin

On Saturday, raise a glass of the wine that helped raise a nation.

Happy Birthday, America! 🇺🇸