Corkiness and soft corks

[Jerry D Mead]

Good exchange, guys. Good last question, Randy. Now all we need to do is get a member of the Cork Council and someone from SupremeCorq to show up...

JDM

[Thomas]

Randy,

I patiently await someone's answer to your cork questions.

[Tari Di Bello]

foodie
Wineboy here, Tari is just a used to be winemaker, and now she's to busy dying her roots to answer you. For that matter so am I. There is a long and complex set of something like 13 grades of corks, which I've done a very good job of forgetting. On top of that every company uses different terminology to grade. I,m going to do this quickly, when there is more time I'll try to get the whole schlamole for you.
Basically the fewer holes and least wood win. You don't want cracks, it's getting to the point where you don't want them over a 1/4" long and I'm seeing these in some very expensive corks. You want good elasticity and memory. A good way to check elasticity is the dreaded chew test, yummers. Yes, some of the best in the business resort to eating corks. It is also nice to have a moisture meter, you want the corks humidity to be between 5-8%.
It seems to me the high end cork of today looks worse than the medium range of 10 years ago at 10 times the price. Sometimes there are no corks I'm happy with or not enough of them.
Now, Mr. foodie your magic word for the day is patience.

[Tari Di Bello]

P.S. There really are no contractual guarantees.

[Paul Wagner]

Curmudgeon:

Your wish is my command. As you know, I used to be the Director of the CQC, so I have a bit of insight into the cork issue.

Here are a few thoughts.

#1. Anyone paying more than about 50-55 cents a piece for cork is being taken to the cleaners. Pure and simple.

#2. While corks have traditionally been graded on appearance,, with the cleaner, less porous corks being more expensive, there is NO evidence that these corks have lower incidences of TCA. In fact, because these very high end corks are rare, and may to to sit around in the factory for a long time, they may be slightly more likley to have higher incidences of TCA.

#3. Winemakers have always wanted the best, cleanest looking corks for their wine. This is what originally led cork producers to bleach the corks with chlorine. It has also led to the huge number of classifications of cork quality. WHile I was at the CQC, we developd an industry standard system that has only 5 classifications of quality. WIneries can insist upon this system from their supplier.

#4. Cork is a natural product, and has flaws. And while foodie is right, it is impossible to definitively test every cork in a bottling run, this is exactly the type of problem that mil spec standards and quality control procedures were designed to solve. Every winery should have a carefully conceived QC program for corks, and analyze each lot of corks for defects, including TCA. By following those procedures, wineries can reduce the incidence of TCA in their wines to well below 5%--Mondavi, Sutter home, Sebastiani for example, all claim less than 2%.

#5. Smaller wineres often have neither the laboratory equipment, expertise nor budgets to do this kind of QC...and often have higher incidences of TCA.

#6. There is a new process developed by BUrklin Wolf in Germany and a group of cork producers that not only limits TCA creation in the production of the corks, but also eliminates 90% of it is finished corks. Commercial quantities of these corks will be available within the year.

Paul Wagner

PS: TCA (2,4,6 Trichloroanisole) is created by any number of molds commonly present in the air at both wineries and cork companies. The mold has only to come in contact with any number of variations of chlorophenols, from chlorine to pentachlorophenol. These, especially the latter, are found EVERYWHERE including virtually every part of the winery or cork company. (Wooden pallets are all treated with Penta, as are most timbers.) The mold is killed by the chlorophenols, but attack it in a defense mechanism that attempts to metabolize the chemical. The by-product of this interaction is TCA. It can happen at every level of production of cork or wine. In fact, the current trend in winemaking is towards wines with higher pH (following ml fermention) and lower concentrations of SO2. This creates a much more habitable environment for mold, and as a result may, in fact, make the wines more susceptible to in vitro TCA formation.

[Paul Wagner]

FYI. In regards to the original posted question, mold needs humidity to grow well. Most cork companies try to keep the moisture level in corks below 7.5%, to eliminate the potential for mold growth on the corks. But a moister cork is easier to insert into the bottle, so each winery has its own moisture specifications. If the Australian winery was having trouble with its bottling line, and increased the moisture content in the corks, it could have created more mold, and TCA.

On the other hand, Austrialians are very up to speed on this stuff--I was a speaker there once, and was very impressesed with their research and conclusions. It would surprise me to see an Aussie winery using wet corks.

But dry corks are also a problem. Below about 5.5%, they lose much of their plasticity, and won't work well in the bottling line nor with a cork puller. If you have been seeing wines with very dry corks, it is probably because the wineries is keeping moisture levels low to prevent TCA formation. This is another example of how important a good QC program is.

Paul Wagner

[Thomas]

Thanks Paul.

Now I am convinced we need to go to screwcaps!!!

[osjohng]

One more question. Does anyone know if you can still use the effected wine for cooking only ?

[Paul Wagner]

I would not used corked wine for anything--I would return it to the retailer or winery and ask for a replacement bottle. On the one hand, TCa is very volatile, and might well evaporate during cooking. On the other hand, why should you have to deal with this--a good bottle will drink well and cook well!

Paul Wagner