Alternative Wine Closures

Hi Gang,

As an offshoot to the recent post on aging corks and tainted wine, I've a question concern.

I've collected and swilled this stuff for about 35 years now. I'd say that in that time, my "average" loss due to poor corks ( both tainted and loose ) is about 5-8%.

While I love ( guess cause I'm an old curmudgeon traditionalist ) the use of cork, I recognize that there is always room for improvement.

The hard thing for me to discern is not the capablity of the new methods for "sealing" a bottle. I'm sure that their "seal" can be a perfect one. What I cannot answer is the effect of a "perfect seal" on the aging of the wine. Air transfer through a cork, albeit miniscule, does have an impact on the aging characteristics.

Would the 27 yQuem or the 47 Huet that I still have one each of in my cellar and expect to hold for some time yet, have aged the way that they have if they had been perfectly sealed ??

I recognize this is really a unpleasant woman for the producers to do any kind of an AB comparison with since the alternative closures are so new.

From my point of view, since the number of years I have left to drink are not what they were when I was 20, I'm sticking with cork for what I call "cellaring" wine and then for other "new" wines .. ie the recent crop of screwcap Sauv Blancs from NZ I've not problem with the new closure.

As a bit of a chuckle, last night Betsy grabbed one of those NZ screwcaps from the "quaffing" section of our cellar and spent 10 minutes trying figure how to get the foil off so that she could put in the corkscrew !! LOL

Art Stratemeyer ============================= A Community Celebration the Joy of Wine,Gardening and the Arts

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