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"Screw the Corks"
The culprit is trichloroanisole,(TCA),a compound formed when chlorine used for bleaching reacts to mold already growing in the cork. This causes cork taint which smells like wet cardboard, musty old cellars, dirty socks and left over dirty laundry. It is estimated that anywhere from 5 to 15% of wines today will have cork taint. Another problem is that the demand for corks has become so high that quality has suffered. You used to be able to rely on the corks in wines that need to age for ten to 20 years to be in reasonably good shape when you finally decided the wine was ready to be drunk. Now we find that many are starting to fall apart at 10 to 15 years. It is quite disheartening to have a cork break in half and have the rest crumble into a wine you have saved and nurtured for years. What can we do about this? Realist say forget corks. All wines need screw caps. The traditionalists say screw caps should only be used in cheap wines that are sold in paper bags. Calmer heads express "Go quietly into the night." Conversion should be gradual and limited. Wines that really need no aging such as Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, Chenin Blanc and most other whites should utilize screw caps. Rosés and reds such as certain Beaujolais should also be counted in the conversion. This will drastically cut back the demand for corks which will enable wines that need to age to enjoy the best quality corks.
One of the first and strongest supporters of the screw cap cause was a collection of New Zealand wineries who formed the New Zealand Screwcap Wine Seal Initiative in 2001. Since New Zealand's best wine is their Sauvignon Blanc, it was a "no brainer."
In California, Randall Graham of Bonny Doon has given up on cork completely. All his wines will be bottles with screw caps until he feels that something better is available.
Even the cork axis of Europe is crumbling. Andre Lurton, a Bordeaux company producing four million bottles of wine a year plans to fit all its white wines with screw caps and may soon offer a red capped also.
"Grand Crew Screwed"
Debunking Breathing
The worry over a wine losing its breath was a big concern with many of my students when I taught “wine appreciation.” I guess they loved wine so much they did not want to see it die. This concern was at its peak when the student was having a dinner party. To alleviate their concerns, I told them to buy an extra bottle of the wine they decided to serve with the dinner. Open it during the final preparations for the dinner and begin sipping the wine. When they felt the wine was ready, it was time to serve the wine. By then, however, the first bottle was empty and concerns for the perfect wine had diminished. Seriously, most breathing theories are myths.
First of all, pulling the cork and leaving the bottle to aerate for minutes or an hour is laughable. It has been scientifically proven that the round opening in the bottle neck is too small to produce any change within a period of 24 hours, let alone 24 minutes. Pulling the cork on a young wine that is not ready to be drunk is to ruin a good bottle of wine; even if you could judge the amount of time to let it “breathe” the bouquet and the aroma would be nonexistent. Remember, 90% of tasting a wine is in your nose. Why lose that important part of the experience?
Old wines taste better than new wines is a myth. The older any wine is the better the taste is untrue. There are very few wines made today that will taste better as they grow old. Those few wines that must be aged (1% of all whites and around 20% of all reds) will die an early death if opened and left to breathe. Fortunately, all other wines are ready to drink within 2 to 4 years after bottling. Wines that need time in the cellar must have the chemistry for aging to improve the taste of the wine. They have to be exposed to the right amount of air during that aging process. The storage conditions have to be temperate, humid, dark and constant. Lastly, time and money must be invested to enable
you to monitor the wine’s aging to know when it is ready.
If you must follow the ritual of letting a wine breathe, use a decanter. The best method is to dump the wine into a decanter. Pouring exposes far many more of the wine’s molecules to air, and the splashing around in the decanter is an effective aerator.
Debunking Legs
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