Tag Archives: Chinese

Why does the screw top controversy rage on?

Posted on by

I have evolved my views on this over the last decade, and must say that I am in very strong favor of using screwtops.  Almost everyone else in the industry globally is also.  Yet, there are a few hold-outs, including the Chinese (who seem to value the cork tradition more at this point in time).  However, I believe that a few influential Chinese ‘wine thought leaders’ will come around quickly to the use of screw tops and then the rest of the nation will follow.

Fortunately the Australia wine industry is almost entirely converted to the use of screw top and recently awarded the 2012 McWilliams Maurice O’Shea Award to the ‘Australian Screwcap Initiative.’  (My use of ‘screw top’ and their use of ‘screwcap’ is interchangeable.)  Usually this prestigious award goes to a great wine, but occasionally it goes to a theme or initiative and awarding it to the use of screw tops was a very bold step by the Australian wine industry which clearly announces the use of screw tops is clearly the future.

Almost simultaneously, the Italian wine authorities have approved the use of screw tops and other synthetic sealers to be used for their higher quality DOC and DOCG wines for the first time.  Even the Europeans are starting to come around!

The science and evidence around the use of a slightly porous cork allowing a good to great wine to reach its full potential is just not there.  Quite conclusively, the marginal potential differences are extremely minor or likely non-existent.  Screw tops provide the same path to maturity and complexity that corks do as what has been bottled inside the seal is sufficient to create to most from the wine.  The quality of the grape, the wine maker and the little bit of air in the ullage is far more important than the minute amount of air that may seep in over the next 10 – 20 years.  And if that air amount is ‘more than a very little,’ the wine will oxidize and turn to vinegar.

Cork has some major issues which can make for a most unpleasant tasting experience:

  • Cork failure rates are between 3% and 15% according to a variety of studies, even with cork quality control and checking – it is just the nature of the beast
  • Sometimes an entire batch of bad corks makes it way to the market and can ruin an entire great vintage of great wine
  • The variability of the exact same wine bottle to bottle is often visible and indicates that at least one of the bottles will be an unpleasant drinking experience!
One of the two undrinkable bottles of 2002 Wolf Blass Black Label

The greatest disappointments I have had in wine drinking to open what you know is or should be a great bottle of wine, only to find it has been ‘corked.’  This has happened to me several times and pouring a $50 – $100 bottle of  wine down the drain feels like ‘wine euthanasia.’  I will try anything to save such as bottle from considering it for cooking to rationalizing that is is drinkable and I just need to reduce my finicky standards a bit!  But if I am going to share the wine others, I will not let it pass and have to move onto the next bottle – if I have a back-up bottle (which I usually do, but this is not always convenient or possible).

I hate to be disappointed, especially when it is beyond my control to have the right outcome.  It is my fault if I leave a vintage far too long and the wine has deadened, lost it fruit, or lost its structure.  I can control that and avoid that happening.  But there is nothing I can do about having received a bottle of wine with a bad cork in it.  And even with a good cork, it is difficult to get 20 years of solid performance without it becoming saturated and starting to seep.  This puts at risk most of your best bottles that require 20 years to age.  That is why every two years, Penfolds offers free re-corking of Grange and other iconic Penfolds wines as some of them require 30 years or more to be optimally drinkable.

My view is that avoiding this disappointment (a corked bottle) far outweighs what extremely small possibility that for a limited few bottles of wine, that aging under cork ‘may’ yield a slightly better result than the same bottle under screw top.  You are guaranteed that bottle after bottle will be at its best and consistent when under screw top.  The only chance of the bottle going bad is if you have scorched it from storing it in too hot a condition.

The other problem with the variability of cork, is that if you have several dozen bottles, they are likely to age differently and the chance you will be drinking each bottle at its best is diminished.  With screw top, you know they will age at the same pace and be consistently drinkable during an optimum period of time.  The need to provide a ‘back-up’ bottle is no longer necessary.

“Yes,” I certainly enjoy the experience of taking out an old cork and will miss that experience more and more over time, but enjoying that sensation does come close to masquerading the the disappointment of a ‘corked’ bottle.  Insist on buying under screw top from now on and don’t take the risk.

How much should a good bottle of wine cost?

Posted on by

The first answer is “Probably more than you are paying for it!”  However, there is such a glut of good wine on the market, and far too many grapes being produced that the cost of a good bottle of wine is relatively inexpensive.  Of course, now that the Chinese are becoming significantly more prosperous in this – the “Year of the Dragon”, and believe they have or are acquiring a taste for good wine, they are buying up the very top end of the market which will certainly push up prices for that segment.

The Chinese are also buying up a lot of wineries and parcels of land that produce grapes around the world and more wine will find its way to China over the next several years.  This will reduce the global glut somewhat.  But by looking around, you should still be able to buy very good wine for under $10 per bottle and even cheaper.

The average bottle of wine in my cellar is around $40 – $50 per bottle, but then I have some truly great wines in my cellar, and many of them have 10 – 20 years of aging built into them so I have a large stock of great wines which are drinkable today.   Yet, I also have a large number of outstanding wines I paid less than $20 per bottle for.  I have very few wines I paid over $100 per bottle, as I find it is just not worth it except for very special occasions to drink a bottle of wine that expensive.  You just do not need to.

Blake Stevens, in his recently published book (which I have reviewed) “Still Stupid at Sixty” has a Chapter entitled “Don’t Overindulge in Passions”.  The point of the chapter is that we can get carried away with our passions and really overspend because we want to treat ourselves to the very best.  He believes that for most things that can be purchased, for the very, very best (measured as being 100% of possible capabilities and quality – assuming you can actually measure these traits at all!), you are paying 10 time more than if you accepted an alternative that was at 99% and that still costs 10 times what the alternative at 95% of capability and quality would cost.  He says this applies to jewelry, stereo systems, and wine among other things.  It is easy to spend $1,000 for a bottle of wine and for that price, it better not just be excellent, but it should also be rare and have collectible value.  But I can find wines for $100 per bottle that almost all people would say was as good or better than the bottle that cost $1,000.  And I could buy bottles of wine for $10 that many if not most people thought was as good or nearly as good as the bottle for $100 or even $1,000.  I think this is true and it is why I have very few bottles anywhere close to $1,000 per bottle (Only two which were used for my wife’s 40th birthday party!).  Do not overspend on wine!  I believe for most people, they do not need to spend over $20 per bottle and there are a number of annual reviews by wine critics that recommend the best buys you can get for under $20 per bottle.  This is a very safe way to buy wine that you know will not disappoint when you open a bottle or bring one to a party.

Two years ago, we did a tasting comparing wines that were made half of the Shiraz grape and half of the Cabernet Sauvignon grape.  We tasted a line-up of Penfolds Bin 389 with vintages from 1995, 1996, 1997, and 1998 and a Wolf Blass Grey Label from 1996.  The Penfolds Bin 389 would have fetched $35 – $50 when they were sold and more now.  The Wolf Blass Grey Label was bought for $16 per bottle (I am so glad I bought 3 dozen of those, but I only have one bottle left!).  However, the group of very discerning wine palettes that evening pick the Wolf Blass as the best wine, even though it cost half or even a third of what the Penfolds Bin 389 vintages cost.

An American friend of mine who had been living in Australia for two years at the time had dinner out with my wife and me and another colleague visiting form the US.  I brought two bottles – one white and one red – to the Indian BYOB restaurant we were eating at.  After finishing both bottles and still having a decent amount of food to eat, my American friend who had been in Australia for two years and I went to the bottle shop next door to get another couple of bottles.  I asked him if he had any favorites he wanted to drink and his response was “Steve, when I arrived in Sydney two years ago, I decided to pay about $30 per bottle and I thought the wine was really good, so then I backed off to about $25  – $28 per bottle and still thought it was really good and then backed off to about $20 per bottle and it was still really good.  I am now down to about $8 per bottle and still think it is really good!  Therefore, you pick something out you like!”

Like I said – and especially in Australia – you can get some really good wine for under $10 per bottle.