(Don’t) Put a cork in it
Corks suck. Oh sure, they look neat and all, but they are a terrible choice for sealing a bottle of wine. Sure, if you save up a bunch of them you can make all sorts of nifty arts and crafts projects – even a boat, if you are so inclined. But if I crack another cork-sealed bottle and get a whiff of mouldy cardboard, I’m going to just…well, probably just dump it down the drain, and open another. Still.
For the uninitiated, I’m referring to the infamous “cork taint” to which so many wines succumb. These “corked” wines smell like damp basement and taste like wet dog. In my humble opinion they are wholly undrinkable, even when the musty smells and tastes are just past sensory threshold levels – I just can’t get past the reek to discover whatever goodness may be hidden underneath. That said, cork taint isn’t physically harmful, so those who care little for olfactory pleasure, and/or who just desperately need a buzz, are completely safe to chug away.
Cork taint is caused by the chemical compound 2,4,6-trichloroanisole (TCA). TCA forms through the interaction of chlorine, organic phenols (found in all organic matter) and mould. It is extremely potent and only very low levels are required to completely destroy the taste and aroma of that bottle of wine you’ve been saving for months in eager anticipation of the day when you finally open it up in hopes of impressing that special someone you finally got the courage to ask out on a date.
Roughly 8% to 12% of all wines bottled with natural corks are contaminated. Better practices in cork technology – selecting healthy pieces of raw cork, cleaning the corks before they are used – can reduce this number, but cork taint still spoils an unacceptably high proportion of wine.
Really, corked wine is unavoidable where natural corks are concerned, as the shittiness of corks as wine stoppers lies in the simple, unchangeable fact of their material being. Corks are chunks of tree bark, punched out of large slabs harvested from cork trees (Quercus suber), a species of deciduous evergreen oak native to southwest Europe and northwest Africa. As organic matter, cork is ripe with organic phenols – and with chlorine a common component of various cleaners and fungi spores everywhere in the very air we breathe, it’s really not difficult for TCA to form in any situation.
Let’s stop and consider this. For all that wine fits into the modern-day image of sophistication and high culture, most wine bottles are sealed with a hunk of bark, even (and especially) the really expensive stuff – and even when there’s a decent chance that this piece of bark contains chemicals that will ruin everything. How…quaint.
Given the prevalence of corked wines, many producers have switched to alternative closures in an effort to avoid financial loss. Too bad so many of them went for synthetic (plastic) corks, which are so much worse than natural corks. I hate synthetic corks so much I give an involuntary grimace of disgust whenever I peel the foil off the top of a bottle and discover a hot pink plug of plastic winking up at me.
Sure, the risk of cork taint is very low with plastic corks, and yes, they integrate nicely with existing bottling equipment – but synthetic closures also rob all fruit from a wine. Don’t ask me how, but any wine that’s been subject to a synthetic cork for more than a couple years will inevitably taste like salad dressing.
Enter the screwcap. Thirty years ago, a wine sealed with a screwcap was something you’d find lurking on bottom shelves. It was inevitably cheap, sweet, high in alcohol and nigh undrinkable. Nowadays, some truly delicious wines sport this closure. The screwcap gives absolutely no indication of quality anymore, despite what some conservative naysayers may preach.
The screwcap is an ideal closure. It carries almost no risk of cork taint, rarely leaks, preserves the freshness of wine far better than any type of cork, yet does not impact the evolution of a wine’s aromas and flavours as it ages. This latter issue was one of the biggest criticisms against screwcaps; it was thought that a wine needed a cork’s imperfect seal to age properly. However, many experts have since gone on to state that this is pretty much crap, including noted Aussie winemaker and author James Halliday, who states, “There is sufficient oxygen in the wine and in the head space to allow that part of development which requires oxygen to take place. And – what is more – much of the development takes place anaerobically (i.e.: without oxygen).”
New Zealand has led the world in welcoming screwcaps: in the past decade, it went from having under 1% of its wines bottled with a screwcap to over 90%. Australia currently bottles over half its wines with a screwcap. As expected, New World producers have been more receptive to this technology than those in the Old World – though even the latter has some screwcaps floating around, if only on the cheap stuff. Still, it will be several more decades before we see the likes of Château Mouton-Rothschild bottled with anything other than tree bark.
Really, the argument against screwcaps is purely one of aesthetics. Even the staunchly conservative types grudgingly acknowledge the Stelvin as a superior closure – from a technical standpoint. But those conservative types are quick to point out that cracking the seal of a screwcap doesn’t have the romance of the gentle popping sound of removing a natural cork from a wine bottle. A well-known Edmonton restaurateur, who absolutely forbids any screwcap-bottled wines from his wine list, likens it to serving one of his finest meals on a paper plate. Natural corks are all about service and presentation; establishments that focus on these aesthetics are obviously not going to welcome the crack of a twisted screwcap befouling the dining room air like cheap perfume. By extension, I guess they also aren’t going to welcome any of New Zealand’s fantastic Sauvignon Blancs or Pinot Noirs, either.
The whole ritual of “properly” opening a bottle of wine is a lot of archaic elitism. Wine used to be the territory of stuffy men in tweed suits; now it’s something the average person enjoys regularly. Let’s drop the snobby pretence, shall we? I’m sure restaurants can come up with better things for their servers to spend their time doing, rather than prising open bottles of potentially corked wine. Like, say, actually having an intelligent discussion about wine with the customers. And hey, I’ve even found a gadget that can be used to open a screwcap – so you don’t even have to sacrifice much of the ritual. (I’ll let you know when I find one of these babies in town.)
The reign of the cork is ending. I, for one, welcome the rising monarchy of screwcaps – though I’m also ok with any other alternate closure that doesn’t destroy the wine. Apparently there’s something called the Zork (great name) out there, which is a glass stopper that manages to make that satisfying popping sound when removed from the bottle. I’m perfectly fine with glass stoppers of any kind – I’ve only encountered one in the wild, and I’d like to see more.
It is silly to follow outdated traditions that cause such easily avoidable problems. Isn’t it far better to fend off some harmless banter about screwcaps than have to apologize for spoiled bottle after spoiled bottle?
While you’re at it, could you try to do something about the abominable habit of bottling milk in plastic, rather than in either glass or waxed cardboard as God intended? Talk about off flavors.