The Auswine Forum

http://www.thedrinksbusiness.com/2015/0 ... tion-test/

Wish there was more detail there and sure that is not a definitive word on the question either...Just pointing out that it isn't always one way or the other...

Will probably do my own comparison soon with some bottlings I have from both that have some age on them...

More details here: http://www.cullenwines.com.au/2015/03/c ... n-stelzer/

Great work Tyson!

Isn't this line a sweet one: "Venice sommelier Annie Martin-Stefannato admitted “we will have to change our mindset”."

Si, that would be a good move.

Meanwhile, on Jamie Goode's website the following article. Smaller tasting sample, just three bottles instead of the five at Vinitaly. The comments section is also worth reading.

http://www.wineanorak.com/wineblog/wine ... d-screwcap

Cheers................Mahmoud.

The wines seem quite early in their evolution. Are there notes on the wines?

I'm finding screw cap a bit Of a concern myself with aussie wines being bistro like with development starved to the point of being boring. This week I had a few bottles of Lovedale and at 10 years there's none of glory of maturing semillon.

I would've liked some notes as well..

As far as Semillon...have had quite a few looking good under screwcap but nothing at the level of Lovedale or Vat 1 where I thought they were as developed as they would be under cork...Does that mean it won't develop? I don't think so..we've clearly seen some Semillon age under screwcap, just maybe not to the level of structure that those two would be. We've also seen riesling develop under screwcap...so it looks like it happens..just a lot more slowly than we'd probably prefer..

I'm hoping they get the balance of ingress air right..because yeah, I don't want to wait 25+ for Vat 1 under screwcap to be where I want it...

Anyways, the article wasn't to say which one people prefer taste wise..but to point out a rather significant one where people did prefer the development under screwcap.....as as the other article pointed out, some tastings that have done that prefer cork..

It's a disappointingly vague article.

I don't think Nebbiolo would go too well under screwcap. Sangiovese? Maybe. Perhaps the best shot more international styled Super Tuscans.

Many of the great Italian wines camouflage taint too. With scalped wines probably occasionally being accepted as being in a shutdown phase which is typical of Nebbiolo.I think we are too early into the evolution of alternative closures to look at Italy. I think there needs to be oxygen ingress and certainly more evaluation. Wendouree under screwcap may well be an indicator.

Mahmoud Ali wrote:Meanwhile, on Jamie Goode's website the following article. Smaller tasting sample, just three bottles instead of the five at Vinitaly. The comments section is also worth reading.

http://www.wineanorak.com/wineblog/wine ... d-screwcap

Cheers................Mahmoud.

I can't believe that they still throw in the issue of reduction as a fault introduced by screw caps. It has been proved again and again that it is a wine making fault, mostly caused by winemakers not adjusting their wine making technics when switching to screw cap.

Agree that notes would really help a whole lot here.

I keep forgetting that several wine makers that I love will be using cork until the grave - because they pay for good cork, and have absolute faith in the process. But it is genuinely exciting to read some of the comparisons coming in now. I buy next to nothing under cork, but I sure as hell have no objection to ordering it in restaurants when someone else is carrying the risk

A very nice interview with Alistair Purbrick of Tahbilk on Grape Radio. Pertinent to this post are his views on screw caps. The interview is about an hour long but is well worth it.

Here is the link to Grape radio - the show is the second one from the top:

http://www.graperadio.com/

Here is the link to the broadcast:

http://www.graperadio.com/podcast/GR-EN ... -02-28.mp3

Cheers..............Mahmoud.

Sorry, I got this from TS ages ago but forgot it until I was doing some inbox cleaning.

All ten wines were prepoured before guests came into the room, which gave the wines a little time to breathe in the glass. I purposely didn’t bias the results by talking about how each wine tasted, but completely left it to them to reflect this back to me before I asked for a show of hands to choose the preference of each pair. After the vote I revealed which was the screw cap and which was the cork.

Cullen Diana Madeline Cabernet Merlot 2005, Margaret River

To me, the screw cap was pure and expressive in its fruit, the cork more dusty, with less purity.

Michelle Shah, English journalist in Italy: For me it is very interesting to taste wines from the new world with different closures. Second wine (cork) more closed, austere, stern, less generous than the first wine, with more silky tannins and more mouthfillng, softer, rounder. I don’t know which one is cork and which is screw cap. I think that number one is cork. (She was incorrect in this assumption)

Monte from Tuscany: I agree in terms of the organoleptic analysic but I think that cork can provide this extra roundness.

Screw cap: 6 votes

Cork: 16 votes



Cullen Diana Madeline Cabernet Merlot 2004, Margaret River

To me, the cork wine had corky notes, woody and sappy. Screw cap more pure in fruit expression and better fruit length.

Ariel Morales from Argentina: I think that when you have this significant period of time in barrique the tannins and flavour of wood is more significant and more retained by the cork and lost by the screw cap. (He was confusing oak character with cork character. I pointed this out in responding)

Monte from Tuscany: Different from the first wine, and we see here a different development of the colour. This is interesting.

Cork: 11 votes

Screw cap: 8 votes

Undecided: 1 vote



Yalumba The Signature Cabernet Sauvignon Shiraz 2003, Barossa

To me, the screw cap was brighter, the cork more meaty.

Ariel Morales from Argentina: I notice something here which is a big difference in terms of the nose. One of the two is much older on the nose, perhaps on the screw cap you can retain this and lose it with the cork.

Julian, winegrower from Romania: I agree with Ariel. Tired on the palate and the nose, green harsh tannins in the second wine (cork) and yet the first (screw cap) is fruity and still developing. Big difference. I believe first is cork and second is screw cap. (He was wrong on this order.)

Monte. I would like to add that in the first wine there is a lot of sediment and there is not in the second. (I explained this was simply a consequence of pouring the wines, not of closure influence)

Screw cap: 14 votes

Cork: 6 votes



Henschke Hill of Grace Shiraz 2004, Eden Valley

To me and to the room, the closest of the tasting. Finer nuances here. Cork fractionally more silky, screw cap fractionally more bright.

Andre, Latin America: For such a noble wine the fact that one of the two uses a screw cap is shocking. I would not consider this at this price. In the others the differences were more neat, here less obvious.

Julian: I find this wine very, very interesting, the difference is very, very small. The first (cork) has more flavour, is more fruity and the nose of the second (screw cap) more developed and heavier. But the quality of the wine makes the difference between the cork and screw cap almost insignificant.

Cork: 7 votes

Screw cap: 13 votes

Undecided 0



Brokenwood Rayner Shiraz 2001, McLaren Vale

To me, the screw cap was brighter on the nose and palate. Cork more developed, secondary.

Ariel: I think that the evolution here is significantly different, more complete and full under screw cap and the finish is latent. The second wine which I think is under cork has dissolved, more developed in colour and in nose. More complete under screw cap, faded in the second. (He was correct on the order here.)

Julian agrees.

Screw cap: 14 votes

Cork: 6 votes

Undecided: 1 vote



Out of five wines, the screw capped bottle was the preference in 3 instances and the cork in 2. Total of 55 votes to the screw cap, 46 to the cork and 2 undecided.


Sadly, the Ata Rangis didn’t arrive in time for the tasting.

Yeah...still a long way for things to go...It doesn't help either that most of the longer term screwcapped reds are minimal ingress...

The one comparison we did lately with a 2003 Meerea Park Alexander Munro went about as expected...two under cork, both different from each other, the "better" one was much more developed than the screwcap but slightly stewwy....the screwcap one had evolved (although I was probably the only one that has tasted both years before) but still very very fresh, very bright, a lot less evolved than the cork version...it could easily be a 2 or 3 year wine but knowing how it was early on, I knew the tannins had softened and the wine gained some complexity...It looks like it'll be awhile before we start seeing some higher ingress screwcaps with some age with reds...but not sure we'll have many cork versions to compare them too...

There is also the feeling that cork might add flavor to the wine....or maybe it has something to do with the evolution itself or some of the flavors we taste when the wine has evolved....