To Cork or Not to Cork?
There's a huge problem in the world of wine and it doesn't rhyme with Shoe Luck Truck. Up to 10% of the bottles released by any given winery contain a compound that spoils the wine. It's called trichloroanisole, or TCA for short. You may have heard of it by its informal name "cork taint" or "corked" as in, "man, this '85 Petrus is corked! Bummer!"
How do you tell if a wine is "corked?" Smell it. If there's a musty/mildew-like aroma then the wine you were about to enjoy has been tainted with TCA. Sometimes the wine smells like wet dog, wet cardboard, or moldy newspaper. Unless a shaggy dog made the wine in a rainstorm, chances are you're going to be mad.
The production of TCA in wine is complex, but I'll use my mad science skills (ha!) to boil it down for you: airborne fungus around corks mixes with chlorine meant to sterilize it and creates TCA.
If you encounter such a wine you should take it back to where you bought it and the retailer almost assuredly will replace it and send it back up the distribution chain to the winery. If they don't, find a new place to buy wine. You won't want to drink it because all you will smell & taste is that musty wood. This is really what you are testing for when presented with the small pour of a new bottle at a restaurant. You obviously don't want to accept a tainted bottle of wine. Especially not at restaurant prices.
The notion that any industry allows a 10 percent failure rate strikes me as slightly insane. Kind of like casting Eddie Murphy in anything anymore. Enter the Screwcap.
We all know the Screwcap. Perhaps you first met it with a bottle of Boone's Farm Sangria in college, or heaven forbid, a bottle of NightTrain Apple Wine from Circle K. With that kind of history, it's no wonder that the Screwcap is fighting an uphill battle as an alternative to natural cork.
But, I'm here to tell you that the Screwcap may be the best thing to happen to a bottle of wine since Robert Mondavi entered the business.
Screwcaps avoid the problem altogether. Screwcaps also help to ward off oxidation which is the 2nd leading killer of a bottle of wine after your's truly.
I can hear all of you asking "why aren't all wines released in screwcaps then?" The short answer is the stigma. Plus, you can't exactly use that fancy corkscrew anymore. But, times are changing. The more people understand the problems with cork the more they'll seek out wines in screwcaps. Then, the more the industry will understand that the stigma is disappearing and be willing to change their practices.
There is another reason that some winemakers avoid the screwcap -- especially French winemakers: a small amount of oxygen enters through natural cork and helps to age the wine, or so it is believed. The argument against screwcaps for them is that the seal is too perfect and the aging process will be stifled. This is just a suspicion because it will take years to see how wines in screwcaps age. But, there's some alternatives on the horizon just for them. New types of liners used in the seal can allow a controllable amount of oxygen into the bottle to help soften the wine over time. Maybe this will finally win them over.
You can help the cause by not furrowing your brow when you hear that fun crackle of the metal closure. You can further help the cause by seeking out bottles in this better type of closure. Plus, you'll have a way to save that unfinished bottle for another day. I don't have that problem, but I hear that some people may.
How do you tell if a wine is "corked?" Smell it. If there's a musty/mildew-like aroma then the wine you were about to enjoy has been tainted with TCA. Sometimes the wine smells like wet dog, wet cardboard, or moldy newspaper. Unless a shaggy dog made the wine in a rainstorm, chances are you're going to be mad.
The production of TCA in wine is complex, but I'll use my mad science skills (ha!) to boil it down for you: airborne fungus around corks mixes with chlorine meant to sterilize it and creates TCA.
If you encounter such a wine you should take it back to where you bought it and the retailer almost assuredly will replace it and send it back up the distribution chain to the winery. If they don't, find a new place to buy wine. You won't want to drink it because all you will smell & taste is that musty wood. This is really what you are testing for when presented with the small pour of a new bottle at a restaurant. You obviously don't want to accept a tainted bottle of wine. Especially not at restaurant prices.
The notion that any industry allows a 10 percent failure rate strikes me as slightly insane. Kind of like casting Eddie Murphy in anything anymore. Enter the Screwcap.
We all know the Screwcap. Perhaps you first met it with a bottle of Boone's Farm Sangria in college, or heaven forbid, a bottle of NightTrain Apple Wine from Circle K. With that kind of history, it's no wonder that the Screwcap is fighting an uphill battle as an alternative to natural cork.
But, I'm here to tell you that the Screwcap may be the best thing to happen to a bottle of wine since Robert Mondavi entered the business.
Screwcaps avoid the problem altogether. Screwcaps also help to ward off oxidation which is the 2nd leading killer of a bottle of wine after your's truly.
I can hear all of you asking "why aren't all wines released in screwcaps then?" The short answer is the stigma. Plus, you can't exactly use that fancy corkscrew anymore. But, times are changing. The more people understand the problems with cork the more they'll seek out wines in screwcaps. Then, the more the industry will understand that the stigma is disappearing and be willing to change their practices.
There is another reason that some winemakers avoid the screwcap -- especially French winemakers: a small amount of oxygen enters through natural cork and helps to age the wine, or so it is believed. The argument against screwcaps for them is that the seal is too perfect and the aging process will be stifled. This is just a suspicion because it will take years to see how wines in screwcaps age. But, there's some alternatives on the horizon just for them. New types of liners used in the seal can allow a controllable amount of oxygen into the bottle to help soften the wine over time. Maybe this will finally win them over.
You can help the cause by not furrowing your brow when you hear that fun crackle of the metal closure. You can further help the cause by seeking out bottles in this better type of closure. Plus, you'll have a way to save that unfinished bottle for another day. I don't have that problem, but I hear that some people may.
posted by The Cask Room, Mike Kallay at
11:19 AM
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