"Joe Ae" > wrote in message
news
> I am curious what the folks on this forum think. I have looked at some
> recent postings regarding corks. Most discussions I saw were focused on
> synthetic versus cork.
>
> I have asked a couple of wine supply stores whether natural cork or
> agglomerated cork are the better and sure enough I got a different answer.
> The cost are very similar at these stores.
> One vendor claimed the agglomerated corks are only for short term storage.
> The natural corks can hold together for much longer storage. The longer
> natural corks are the best for long term storage.
> The other vendor told me natural corks can have defects due to the
> manufacturing process he prefers agglomerated.

The jury is still out on this issue, and confusion reigns supreme.

Natural cork is great - except for two things:
1) TCA (cork taint) problems. Even the most expensive corks, which can run
as high as 50¢ each, have the potential to ruin the wine they are supposed
to be protecting. There's no way to know in advance either. You find out
eventually when you open the bottle.
2) Co$t. Natural corks run at least double, and can be as much as 5x the
price of synthetics or agglomerates.

Synthetics are gaining popularity rapidly. The cork taint problem doesn't
exist with them, but they have other issues, such as being either too hard
to extract from the bottle and/or corkscrew or too easy, which can result in
"self-extraction". The most worrisome (to me) issue with full synthetics is
that they don't seem to protect the free SO2 in the wine very well. This is
being worked on by the manufacturers, but they aren't there yet, so in
general synthos are mostly used for wines that aren't intended for long term
aging.

Agglomerated corks are something of a mixed bag. Some of them seem to be
better than others, and the best of them are the so called 1+1 style, which
has a disk of natural cork glued to each end of an agglomerated cork. This
is a reasonable compromise in terms of cost and quality, but from what I've
heard they have the potential of having TCA problems because of that slice
of natural cork.

All in all, I'd say the best promise for the future lies in Stelvin
screwcaps - but these are obviously not for the home winemaker.

Tom S