I frequent another online 'foodie' board that has a section devoted to wine.
Our own Hunt also can be found there.

A recent topic on that board includes a post, from someone who seems to have
a reasonable depth of wine knowledge, supporting the 'theory' that the
extent to which the bottle aging of wine is a function of gasses passing
through the cork is of little consequence if any at all. He cites three or
four sources, from Hugh Johnson to Jamie Goode to an expert at UCDavis, in
support of the theory that (if I'm understanding correctly) whatever
aeration of wine causes it to mature in the bottle occurs during the
bottling itself and not later on. One quote is from Richard Gibson (I
presume the one who is head of SouthCorp/Penfolds) who told the poster that
"I am inclined to think that bottle maturation is essentially anaerobic".

In fairness to the poster, his main objective was (I think) to support
stelvin closures through the logic that cork really doesn't 'do anything'
anyway, so don't get upset about screwtops.

What do you guys think? Is all the debate about the role of cork closures
in 'better wine maturation' just meaningless? I have to admit that I find
this pretty hard to get behind, based on years and years of being taught the
opposite.

In the last few months, I've tasted two wines under screwcap closures
that stood out for their aged characteristics.

The 04 Torbreck Woodcutter's Semillon showed the sort of creamy, nutty
& toast flavours that I'd expect to see in an older Semillon (as
opposed to the out and out citrusyness of a young one), and a
Stoneleigh Riesling from the same year I've commented about on here
showed an incredible nose of petrol smoke, citrus and peach.

The Stoneleigh stood out particularly, because I'd had the good
fortune of opening a couple of bottles a year and a half ago when in
New Zealand. At that time, it was showing the very typical youthful
Riesling character, so the evolution was quite remarkable. Definitely
proof that wines can age under screwcap (and best of all - nothing
corked!)

,idlife wrote:
> I frequent another online 'foodie' board that has a section devoted to wine.
> Our own Hunt also can be found there.
>
> A recent topic on that board includes a post, from someone who seems to have
> a reasonable depth of wine knowledge, supporting the 'theory' that the
> extent to which the bottle aging of wine is a function of gasses passing
> through the cork is of little consequence if any at all. He cites three or
> four sources, from Hugh Johnson to Jamie Goode to an expert at UCDavis, in
> support of the theory that (if I'm understanding correctly) whatever
> aeration of wine causes it to mature in the bottle occurs during the
> bottling itself and not later on. One quote is from Richard Gibson (I
> presume the one who is head of SouthCorp/Penfolds) who told the poster that
> "I am inclined to think that bottle maturation is essentially anaerobic".

FWIW, that is also the view that M. Pronay holds (and has expounded on
here). However, from my reading of the Davis studies, there are both
aerobic and anaerobic aging processes. It's unclear if you get the same
wine from anaerobic maturation as you do from both combined.


> What do you guys think? Is all the debate about the role of cork closures
> in 'better wine maturation' just meaningless? I have to admit that I find
> this pretty hard to get behind, based on years and years of being taught the
> opposite.

In support of the unimportance of air ingress for proper aging of wine,
Herr Pronay has cited the recovery of wines from sunken ships, where
they had aged while submerged in seawater. By his account (and I have
no reason to doubt it) the wines were in fantastic condition. Likewise,
he also cites wine in sealed glass bottles. I still have my skepticism,
though, about whether you get the *same* sort of aqing [1], and also on
whether it happens at the same rate: I don't really want to have to wait
50 years for my 2005 Bdx purchases to reach maturity. This is what I
hope to see resolved by the AWRI's ongoing closure study. It's also
worth noting that in recent years the screwcap manufacturers have
changed their closures to permit greater amounts of air ingress,
implicitly embracing the notion that some amount of air is needed for
the "proper" aging of wine.

Mark Lipton

[1] Having just written that statement, I'm struck by my memories of the
tube vs. solid state amplifier debates of the '60s and '70s. It's
likely that, if screwcaps do become the norm, our tastes will shift to
embrace the taste of wine that's aged under screwcap.

On Apr 3, 11:29 am, "Salil" > wrote:
> In the last few months, I've tasted two wines under screwcap closures
> that stood out for their aged characteristics.
>
> The 04 Torbreck Woodcutter's Semillon showed the sort of creamy, nutty
> & toast flavours that I'd expect to see in an older Semillon (as
> opposed to the out and out citrusyness of a young one), and a
> Stoneleigh Riesling from the same year I've commented about on here
> showed an incredible nose of petrol smoke, citrus and peach.
>
> The Stoneleigh stood out particularly, because I'd had the good
> fortune of opening a couple of bottles a year and a half ago when in
> New Zealand. At that time, it was showing the very typical youthful
> Riesling character, so the evolution was quite remarkable. Definitely
> proof that wines can age under screwcap (and best of all - nothing
> corked!)

It seems you are saying that wines age even faster under screwcap than
under cork. IMO, a 2004 wine that is showing that much age in 2007 is
not necessarily such a good thing.

Andy

The other issue -whether one believes that wine can age anaerobically
or not- is the inconsistency of corks. I'll have to look, but on one
board someone posted a study of gas exchange with standard corks. I
would have predicted a fairly standard bell curve- or if anything one
with a smaller standard deviation (taller thinner bell curve). But the
study showed what would be a flatter curve - a larger standard
deviation than a normal distribution (sorry if I'm getting language
wrong, my last statistics class was 27 years ago, and as it was a
morning class I seldom made it). So a sizeable % of the corks allowed
in 5 or 6 times the amount of gases as the another sizable %. There's
a good explanation for bottle variation from the same case!

On Apr 4, 12:16 pm, "AyTee" > wrote:
> It seems you are saying that wines age even faster under screwcap than
> under cork. IMO, a 2004 wine that is showing that much age in 2007 is
> not necessarily such a good thing.

I'm not saying they age faster under screwcap than under cork. All I'm
saying is that they age, in response to the opening post.

How fast they age - that is, if they do - seems like it's more heavily
influenced by elements in the winemaking, bottling and possibly
storage. I've had a couple of 3-4 year old German Rieslings showing
slightly similar characteristics to the Stoneleigh Riesling I
commented on, and as for Australian Semillon - the nuttier/toasty
flavours can sometimes start to show after just a few years,
particularly from the Barossa.