Pedro Ximénez Sherry

Pedro Ximénez — universally shortened to PX — is the sweetest, darkest and most syrupy style of Sherry: a fortified wine from Andalusia in southern Spain, made from Pedro Ximénez grapes that are laid out on esparto-grass mats to shrivel in the sun into raisins before pressing. The result is a near-black, mahogany-to-ebony liquid so thick it coats the glass, carrying upward of 400 grams of sugar per litre — one of the sweetest wines made anywhere. It smells and tastes of dried fig and raisin, date, molasses, treacle, dark chocolate, espresso and liquorice, with a warming lift from its roughly 15–20% alcohol. Aged oxidatively in a solera of old casks, it is poured in tiny measures as a dessert wine or digestif, drizzled over vanilla ice cream, or paired with blue cheese and dark chocolate. Rich to the point of decadence, PX is less a drink than a spoonful of liquid raisin.