Damn you, Portuguese menace!

Today's victim:

My last bottle of the 2002 Dönnhoff Oberhäuser Leistenberg Riesling Kabinett

[David M. Bueker]

ouch

[James Roscoe]

Go screwcaps!!!!

[David M. Bueker]

Go DIAM!

Take up birding! More fun and you can always take along some cheap SC vino.

I have just listened to a brief report on French Télématin entitled "the natural cork under threat". The shocked reporter noted that over 10% of wine bottles were closed with plastic stoppers or screwcaps but went on to add "But don't worry. For the vast majority of French, the natural cork is synonymous with quality."

There is a long way to go before I'll be seeing many French wines under screwcap.

My guess is that DIAM is likely to be far more acceptable to the European consumer than screwcaps. Regrettably plastic closures are too .

I feel your pain, Salil.

Some time ago I proposed that German Riesling, and Alsatian Gewurz/Riesling seem to be disproportionately effected by TCA. I run at >5% TCA for these wines, while running at less than 2% TCA for all other whites. David shot down my proposal claiming that Riesling and Gewurz are simply more transparent to TCA. After a recent spate of corked Alsatian Gewurz this is a good opportunity to call the question again - Why do so &#^@! many of my Rieslings and Gewurz from Germany and Alsace suffer from TCA taint?

PS: I am not particularly TCA sensitive either.

Could it be a CONSPIRACY by the nefarious Portuguese to short change the Germans and Alsatians on cork quality so that lovers of a good riesling have no option but to drink a Vinho Verde?

Bah. We'll just drink screwcapped or vinolok sealed Riesling instead.

Where's my Anrecht?

Sam,
well, one possibility is that Riesling producers skimp on buying good corks.

But it seems more likely to me that David's contention is correct. Riesling/Gewurz might be more transparent. Which could be due to grape, but partially also due to style ( maybe oak, rare in Riesling or Gewurz, can mask borderline cases). A TCA hypersensitive might sense TCA at 2 or 3 ppm t in an oaked Chardonnay where you missed it, but you both might get at those levels in a more exposed wine (wheras you might not sense taint till 5 or 6 ppt in that Chardonnay.

I guess another explanation might be systemic issues in German/Alsace wineries, but I've not experienced that.

[James Roscoe]

Take up birding! More fun and you can always take along some cheap SC vino.

Bob? Where have you been? When did you start buying wine from South Carolina?

SC...screw cap.

2 weeks down in S Alberta doing bird surveys.

But it seems more likely to me that David's contention is correct. Riesling/Gewurz might be more transparent. Which could be due to grape, but partially also due to style ( maybe oak, rare in Riesling or Gewurz, can mask borderline cases).

Dale,

You may well be correct. However, I don't understand why I run into TCA much less frequently on Muscadet and white Bourgogne wine, which I drink quite a lot of. It seems that those wines would be fairly transparent to TCA as well. My burden is that I am a stat geek. When I plug my data into Minitab it says that the incidence of TCA in Riesling/Gewurz is significantly worse than all other groups at a high confidence limit (90%). While the stats can't account for the transparency issue they certainly show that the difference, within my ability to detect TCA, is not random chance. Perhaps I am just the victim of really, really bad luck.

Most recently 3 of 4 bottles of 2006 Z-H Gewurz were corked to high heaven. The other bottle was prestine.

[David M. Bueker]

pristine...

Anyway, I cannot account for your issue with the 2006 Gewurz other than there was a bad batch of corks or ZH has developed a winery issue (I doubt it).

I do generally find a higher quality cork in wines from Burgundy, so that might explain part of your results. One the other hand, I don't find any less incidence of cork problems in Muscadet than in German Riesling. I've had more than my fair share of corked 2005 Pepiere Briords to name one.

"Pristine" indeed.

It's baffling to me, David. I'm confident in my findings as I almost always have someone to confer with on the TCA diagnosis, and the TCA is generally not subtle. In fact it tends to be quite overwhelming.

Here is the data (sample sizes are all in excess of 200 bottles):

German Riesling - 5.5% corked
Alsatian Riesling - 6.2% corked
Alsatian Gewurz - 7.2% corked (spiked after recent Z-H fiasco)
Muscadet - 1.5% corked
White Bourgogne - 1.8%

[David M. Bueker]

Just question because I run into this from time to time - what % of your Muscadet is under plastic cork?

[James Roscoe]

Go to this Facebook page. There is some major propaganda on this one. I almost joined up to try to enlighten them, but....

OUCH, Salil!

I have had far too many treasured, long and lovingly cellared, bottles ultimately ruined by a bad cork than I wish to recall.

Long live stelvin!!

-Paul W.

Just question because I run into this from time to time - what % of your Muscadet is under plastic cork?

David,

The two regular drinkers are under cork. I don't recall plastic being used on any of the occasional odd-ball Muscadet that we drink. I think the percentage is close to zero.

[David M. Bueker]

Well I certainly cannot explain it Sam, other than perhaps that potentially bad batch of corks on the ZH. I get just as many corked wines from the Loire regions as I get from Alsace and Germany.

Just looking at my records, Chablis is an area where I get a lot of corked wines (not to mention the oxidized ones). But again it runs in batches (e.g. 3 corked bottles of 2002 Brocard Chablis Sainte Claire in a row at one point).

With me standing in my Loire-heads T-shirt,which boldly claims "Drink Vouvray and Muscadet"
I proudly opened my Huet `99 Vouvray Sec for the staff at Devines downtown.

Corked and oxidized!!