Rare Wine Co. George Washington Special Reserve Madiera

Made in collaboration with Mount Vernon, this wine celebrates not only The Father of Our Country but also Washington’s love of Madeira, which emerged in the 1750s and continued until his death. In 1798, just a year before Washington died, a visitor to Mount Vernon reported that the former President “loves to chat after dinner with a glass of Madeira in his hand.”

The Rare Wine Co. is indebted to both Barbeito’s Ricardo Freitas, who makes all of the Historic Series wines, and Aaron Nix-Gomez (the wine historian who writes hogsheadwine.com), who sifted through Washington’s Madeira correspondence to learn what he most liked to drink. Based on what Aaron found, we’ve concluded that Washington favored “rich” Madeira, which in the parlance of the time meant sweet.