By Michael Chatfield
While shopping for wine bargains at Trader Joe’s the other day,
I came upon a Sauvignon Blanc in an attractively shaped bottle from
R.H. Phillips. Because I am a sucker for cool packaging, I picked
it up.
By Michael Chatfield
While shopping for wine bargains at Trader Joe’s the other day, I came upon a Sauvignon Blanc in an attractively shaped bottle from R.H. Phillips. Because I am a sucker for cool packaging, I picked it up.
What immediately got my attention was the cork fastened with string around the neck of the bottle. It was a perfectly normal wine bottle cork, imprinted with the usual Phillips logo. But there was a red paper wrapper around it, with “www.corkamnesty.com” printed on it.
I looked more closely at the wine, only to find that there was no cork in the bottle, but that it was closed with a screw-top.
Intrigued, I looked over the shelves to see if any other respected winemakers were following this trend. Sure enough, Bonny Doon’s Big House Red and Big House White both had screw tops.
What’s up with that? Winemakers have been sealing their bottles with corks for centuries.
I thought that only the makers of beverages meant for consumers more interested in the buzz than the bouquet would stoop so low as to utilize the lowly screw-top.
Boy, was I wrong.
Back at my trusty computer, I followed R.H. Phillips’ link to a highly informative Web site dedicated to the screw top and came away wondering why the industry still uses corks at all.
Evidently, natural cork contains the chemical 2,4,6 trichloroanisole (TCA), which aside from sounding like something related to proctology causes a condition in wine known as “cork taint.”
TCA is formed when microorganisms in wood or bark are exposed to and react with chlorine.
According to Phillips, between 2 and 10 percent of bottled wine is affected by TCA to some degree. The chemical can infect wine with that musty, moldy flavor that will absolutely ruin a wine experience.
That’s not so bad when you’re in a restaurant. If the wine is corked, you send it back and try another. All in a day’s work for the sommelier or waiter.
But when you’re at home, settled in for a nice dinner with family or friends and about to show everyone what a hotshot wine dude you are with your choice of Chateau de Froufrou, it can be an annoying, and potentially embarrassing occurrence.
Add the inconvenience of driving back to the store for another bottle and you can see the case for screw tops.
The problem is getting worse, as more and more wine is being sold in bottles, rather than in bulk and cork manufacturers are forced to use substandard product, formerly used for gaskets and flooring.
That means that more and more wine will be ruined by exposure to air because the lower-quality cork forms an imperfect seal in the bottle.
Screw-top closures have been around a long time.
Because they have been used for many years in lower-quality and jug wines, most people don’t think that fine wine can come out of a bottle that’s sealed with a screw-top. But they can, and they do.
Bonny Doon, of Santa Cruz and Paso Robles, has been on the screw-top bandwagon for a while now.
They released their 2001 Ca’ del Solo Big House Red and Big House White with a Stelvin model screw top.
Consumer reaction was mixed, at first. Some were skeptical, some laughed; some turned up their noses and made references to Boone’s Farm and Thunderbird.
But eventually, when the advantages became apparent, customers were won over.
These days, Bonny Doon’s entire production is closed with screw-tops, except for a couple of products that require special bottles not screw-top compatible (such as sparkling wine).
John Locke of Bonny Doon says that the choice to eschew the cork was “the right thing to do. For us, it was a 100 percent quality decision.”
Continued next week.
