For The Love Of Port

We all complain about corked bottles and things like Cockburn's 1983, is just maddening.

Would you be willing to buy Vintage Port and other styles of Port in a bottle with an alternative closure, like a screw cap (Stelvin) if you knew it would allow the wine to age properly?

Would for sure.

The feeling when opening a bottle with "cork errors" - and especially rare and old ones - it's terrible. After a while - when getting used to it - you won't mind.

Best regards
Henrik

Absolutely. I hear nothing but good things about screw caps. This link talks about why they are superior:

http://wine.about.com/od/storingwines/a/Screwcaps.htm

I love the feeling of uncorking a new bottle as much as anyone, but I am willing to unscrew a bottle if it means that I will never have the problems associated with corks and synthetic corks.

Nope, at least not yet. Ask me about it after they've done a 30 year study on screw caps, because that's the minimum you'll need for Port. A 30 month study doesn't really prove anything to me.

Now if you're going to stipulate that the Port ages properly, then sure. I don't really care what they use to stopper the bottle. But at this point in time I don't yet believe that screw caps will produce the same end result as cork stoppered bottles.

I am with Glenn, I would want some research and ideally the ability to do a comparable tasting at multi decade age to see how the cap material/oxygen transfer etc. had influenced the bottle development.

On my recent trip to the Douro a port producer (can't remember which one) told me that screw-caps also have their own challenges in terms of achieving an air-tight seal which could lead to excessive oxidation. Like Glenn, I would be happy to buy a case in 20 to 30 years time when some real evidence exists about the long-term ageing potential of wines sealed in this way.

Personally, I would much rather pay an extra £1 per bottle if it was a way of guaranteeing better quality corks were used. Crasto are currently investing lots of time and money in ensuring they reduce the possibility of cork taint to an absolute minumim. They are even able to trace each and every cork back to source and to the specific bottling run and, I believe, guarantee to replace any bottle that has been damaged by the cork. If every port producer followed the same practice we wouldn't have to contemplate screw caps :wall:

Derek

A few comments from a wine producer on this topic here:
http://www.wineloverspage.com/nz/gago.phtml
They're still waiting for a 40 year study too.

I don't think we will see screw caps in Port Wine bottles with age potential. From what I have read and seen, and contrary to what Derek says, screw cap does not make possible a slow oxidation, essential for a good ageing of the wine. It simply closes too much the bottle, reducing the wine. On the other hand, some studies show that plastic cork has a short expiration date. After a couple of years it'll start to loose the contact with the glass and the wine will oxidize faster.

Cork allows a slow oxidation of the wine, which is complementary to its aging process. Moreover, cork is the closure with the longest expiration date.

Just an interesting story about natural corks that somebody in the Douro told me: some years ago, a Spanish top winery was looking for a super cork for its iconic wine. They were willing to pay 1 euro per cork, which is, as you know, REALLY expensive for a cork. They chose one provider and some time after the wine was bottled, TCA appeared in a high rate of bottles... :wall: This is something really serious and just shows the vulnerability of the wine. It is a kind of lottery, and you need luck!

oscarquevedo wrote:some years ago, a Spanish top winery was looking for a super cork for its iconic wine. They were willing to pay 1 euro per cork, which is, as you know, REALLY expensive for a cork. They chose one provider and some time after the wine was bottled, TCA appeared in a high rate of bottles...

In this day and age, there should be some way to test on a cork-by-cork basis for TCA. A laser blast and read the spectrum of the smoke for some kind of signature that indicates TCA. Given the amount of wine spoiled by this problem, it seems the industry should be looking for a cork test with high reliability.

See the other thread on returning corked bottles: If the INDUSTRY had to pay for all the corked bottles out there, just maybe they would pay for some basic research into this problem.


After all, when a cork is right, it really is the best way to seal up wine for the long term.

I would be all-in for whatever type of 'device' were used for sealing a bottle, if the expectation was that it would remain sealed regardless of the vintage.

If it is screw-tops, then so be it. However seeing how a bottle gone bad with a cork becomes 'corked', does that mean that a bottle gone bad with a screw-top becomes 'screwed'?

Glenn E. wrote:Nope, at least not yet. Ask me about it after they've done a 30 year study on screw caps, because that's the minimum you'll need for Port. A 30 month study doesn't really prove anything to me.

Now if you're going to stipulate that the Port ages properly, then sure. I don't really care what they use to stopper the bottle. But at this point in time I don't yet believe that screw caps will produce the same end result as cork stoppered bottles.

I am skeptical whether the the screw cap will work with 20-40 year aging. If it works, then sure, but why mess with tradition? Why not just put vintage port into a box and save packaging space? One could double the amount of port for the same cubic storage...

oscarquevedo wrote:I don't think we will see screw caps in Port Wine bottles with age potential. From what I have read and seen, and contrary to what Derek says, screw cap does not make possible a slow oxidation, essential for a good ageing of the wine.

Cork allows a slow oxidation of the wine, which is complementary to its aging process. Moreover, cork is the closure with the longest expiration date.

Could the inject oxygen into the bottle then use a screw cap or would the oxygen be spent after a while then we are in the same place as before with no additional slow aging?

What happens to port that gets no oxygen at all over the long term?

Having read lots of articles and threads on this it seems there are two main issues, as Oscar stated. The first is since it totally closes out all oxygen the wines often become reductive in bottle, most noticeably with wines needed long term aging, which is not a good thing. The second is there is about the same amount of bad bottles just like when using cork. As the screw tops sometimes dont seal perfectly and when that happens air gets in and oxidizes the bottle. Or someone at a store grabs and slightly twists the bottle to break the seal a little, without the seal being noticably broken. Or as Oscar stated, over time the plastic liner in the cap starts to go bad.

So I don't see the rush at the moment to go to screw caps for anything except wines made for immediate drinking...such as a basic Ruby or Tawny, or a Rose (plus makes it easier to open without needing a cork screw)

Andy Velebil wrote:So I don't see the rush at the moment to go to screw caps for anything except wines made for immediate drinking...such as a basic Ruby or Tawny, or a Rose (plus makes it easier to open without needing a cork screw)

For rubies, tawnies, whites and roses I think the T-cap makes a good job.

What experience you have with wax seal bottles? Wax better protects the cork that an aluminium capsule. But at the same time it prevents the cork to contact with oxygen. Do you find wax sealed bottles more time reduced that aluminium capsuled bottles?

oscarquevedo wrote:

Andy Velebil wrote:So I don't see the rush at the moment to go to screw caps for anything except wines made for immediate drinking...such as a basic Ruby or Tawny, or a Rose (plus makes it easier to open without needing a cork screw)

For rubies, tawnies, whites and roses I think the T-cap makes a good job.

What experience you have with wax seal bottles? Wax better protects the cork that an aluminium capsule. But at the same time it prevents the cork to contact with oxygen. Do you find wax sealed bottles more time reduced that aluminium capsuled bottles?

yes T-Caps also serve the same easy open purpose and I see no real difference between them for bottles made for immediate drinking.

As for wax, from what I've read and talked to people wax doesn't totally prevent oxygen to transmit through the cork. There is still some that works it way through, although less than just an aluminum capsule. So it does reduce some oxygen, but not enough to cause reductive issues.

Other than that, I generally hate wax seals. They are messy, hard to remove, and generally tend to crack off as they age anyways. I understand that there is better quality wax now that is more pliable and won't totally dry out and crack off, and is easier to remove from the bottle.

But how much extra labor cost does it add per bottle to have to hand wax each bottle? I assume it has to be a lot. And is it really worth the extra cost? IMO probably not. Corks and bottles are now far better in quality and I'm not sure they need for waxing is still there. What are your thoughts on waxing bottles?

If a hot tong touches the wax, man does it smell bad. I do think it's worth hand waxing on large format bottles, or special presentation bottles. The last regular hand waxed bottles I recall were all Morgon's. I assume it is traditional there to hand wax bottles?

I can see the worth for vintage port to be waxed. Vintage port is suppose to be an event. They are bottles that are held for generations and opened with tradition and circumstance. So why not put them in wax?

I know for us, we drink them all the time, but we are minority. The capsule is for sure easier, If one is to use a capsule, at least make it out of lead!

Andy Velebil wrote:But how much extra labor cost does it add per bottle to have to hand wax each bottle? I assume it has to be a lot. And is it really worth the extra cost? IMO probably not.

I don't think the issue is cost. If wax was a great thing, and the hand labor were expensive, wax sealing machines would be used. They do exist, but aren't real common. I know of plenty of breweries in the US that put wire hoods on beer bottles by hand, and those bottles sell for less than most of the Port we are talking about.

oscarquevedo wrote:What experience you have with wax seal bottles? Wax better protects the cork that an aluminium capsule. But at the same time it prevents the cork to contact with oxygen. Do you find wax sealed bottles more time reduced that aluminium capsuled bottles?

On a non-port wine (2005 Chianti), I just opened two 3 liter bottles (good party :twisted: 55 bottles of wine) with hard wax capsules over the cork. The wine was better, if anything, than the .750L bottles I drank last year. Of course, if the corks had been contaminated, all the wax in the world wouldn't have protected the wine. And yes, I'm still picking flakes of hard red wax out of everything, and my hand is healing nicely where I stabbed myself getting the wax off.

Now I think of it, the wax on the bottle of 1966 Taylor-Fladgate VP that disappointed me was in pretty bad shape: chipped and crumbling. It was concealed by the capsule, which looked OK, so neither the seller nor I could know in advance. I wonder if the problems with the port (acetone and mustiness /?corkedness?) were from the time during which it was well-sealed or from after the wax was damaged?

I've seen some latex based capsules which look and feel like wax, but come off much more easily. Just slice it off.

Would I buy a VP with a screw cap? - No! For a bottle that requires long-term aging in order to reach its peak, a screw cap just isn't the way to go. If the wine was intended for immediate drinking I wouldn't have problem with a screw top enclosure, but for something that might spend 20-30 years (or more) maturing I don't believe that a screw top offers the best protection against oxidation.

Marc