cork or screwcap?

[Ken Gargett]

just came across this. bruce tyrrell is from a very prominent aussie winemaking dynasty.

Screwcaps 'best thing ever' for fine wine – Tyrrell

Published: 30th April 2010

Written by: Nigel Huddleston

Australian winery boss Bruce Tyrrell says screwcaps have been the “greatest thing that’s happened” for sales of his company’s fine wines.

He said that sales of Tyrell's premium Semillons – the company’s signature wines – grew 25-30% within six months of the company abandoning natural cork for metal closures.

In a flagship speech this morning, Tyrrell told the Fine Wine 2010 conference – organised by Ribera del Duero’s Consejo Regulador de la Denominacion de Origen and managed by Wine Intelligence – that for Semillon “the slightest hint of taint on a cork will stand out like a dunny on a ridge”.

Tyrrell added: “With screwcaps there are no disappointments and we can’t afford to have any.

“Fine wine has to be a great experience every time it hits the table.”

Tyrrell said Australian wine owed a lot to the UK market but was now being “questioned on quality”.

He added: “Ten years ago the price of good drinking wine was £3.99 and today it’s still £3.99. You can’t continue to maintain the same quality without a shift in price.”

[lemmycaution]

you should be able to take it back to the retailer, unless you have had it for a while. no big deal if it is a quaffer but if you've paid $50 or $100 or $1000 for it, a bigger deal. and if you are somewhere where it is the only bottle or the special bottle for a dinner...

Yeah, I brought it back. It definitely agree with what you have wrote, a corked bottle can be a huge disappointment.

[ARRV]

Screwcap

Anything to consistently preserve the product - why take the risk with the product when there is a solution.

Must admit that one exception (to properly disclose my hypocrisy) is champagne - the idea of knocking a crown seal off a bottle of veuve doesnt seem quite right - the thrill of nearly taking someone's eye out with a projectile cork is one of the few joys permissbile these days in an over cautious society (although the more expensive the bottle the more conservatitve the opening so as not to lose a precious drop).

Interestingly I read the other day of some ancient wine being discovered with traces of olive oil - or maybe it was the amphora it was in - anyway the belief is that oil was poured on the wine in the container to act as a seal to prevent oxidation.

So forget cork, screwcaps or rags - go ancient - oil your wine