nice show and interesting guest.

it´s curious, there is possibly no other product in the world than wine, where 1 or 2% failure rate is more or less accepted. In my opinion cork is an antiquated closure. I once opened a bottle of a famous spanish gran reserva in the 50,- ? range and it was clearly undrinkable because of the cork taint. It was a spoiled evening too.
Many wineries in germany or austria are using by now screw caps or glas closure, especially for white wines, to improve customer satisfaction. Some of these winemakers allege that around 30% of their wines in some way had been adversely affected by cork. Sometimes its only a lack of fruit or a certain dullness but by all means different to the wines they bottled.

ok, cork is a natural product with some favorable characteristics but its also a limited resource and we should use it only for high quality wines that want to age. All the other wines, maybe 95% of all need an up-to-date closure (like screw cap) to satisfy the demands of winemakers, merchants and customers.

btw I like portugiese wines too

greets from the ruhrgebiet

I didn’t like the guest. Annoying. I agree with DrEdwardo about corked wines.

One of the best guests ever. I really enjoyed the conversation.

QOTD: coffee beans?

Really interesting show – thought the chemistry with Liza was phenomenal. It was like watching twins 😉 What made it so interesting was that Liza was able to bring in some contrasting opinions in a pleasant and engaging way. Could really imagine her as a co-host – way to go!!!

Screwcaps are fun!!!

Corked Statistics MIND BLOWING!!!! 3% to 7%

I don’t know how reliable this information is but i found this on google:

A ‘Corked’ wine is a wine that has been bottled with a cork that is contaminated with TCA (2,4,6-Trichloroanisole). TCA contamination usually comes from corks but can also come from barrels, other cooperage or even, apparently, from wood within the cellar including walls or beams. The term ‘corked wine’ is applied to all wines with TCA contamination because corks are the souce of most of the problems. The wine industry estimates that as many as 3% to 7% of all wines have TCA contamination at levels that can be detected by consumers. Because most people are not trained to recognize the smell and taste of TCA, only a very small fraction of these bad bottles are ever returned to stores or sent back at a restaurant.

@DrEdwardo I agree 100%. The influence of cork is there and undeniable. The worst influence of cork is the “hidden contermination”. Meens you don’t get a clear cork taint, but the wine is somehow outoff range. There a many serious winemakers (even in Germany) who tested cork vs screwcap on a longer term. Some back to 5 Years an longer. The Results clearly speak for screwcap/Stainlesscap.

@gary: Thanks for another nice Episode. In case of the Petalos 2007 i totally disagree. I just tasted it a few days ago at the german winefair “Prowein”. One of the best wines in this pricerange tasted so far. No poopiness at all, enourmous balance, fruit, depth and structure. Just amazing for such a young wine. I thinks you nailed it with the 2006
(EP #608) but in #654 ??

Greetz from Germany
Micha

Amazing show with a great guest! Forget pairing wines and food, we’ve found the perfect critic pairing!

QOTD: No idea, and I’m not going to be a “bozo” and look it up. However, please tell us the answer next episode!

By the way, I’m really pro screw-top. I think until we have some genuine empirical data it’s going to be impossible to qualify benefits and deficits with any accuracy. We can, however, start the arduous process of breaking down the irrational stigmas people have against a fine wine with a screw-top. Irrational.

Gary –
Now this I found to be a sensational episode. While the “wine chick” may not have been as charasmatic as other guests, I loved her knowledge of the wine industry. Your interaction and dialogue with her was great. The discussion of cork vs screw top was also great – wine geeky but great.

I really enjoyed this one. Made up for a few so-so episodes in the past few weeks.

Good job.

I never sensed your were “that high” on Portugal wines based on past episodes. Soory, I’ll have to pay better attention.

Great episode – I like the impromptu discussion on corks.

If it’s between cork and screwtops, I’m usually happy to open a screwtop. But if I had my choice, I’d go for glass found in the Vino Seal by Alcoa. One of our local wineries – NW Totem Cellars turned me on to them and I like the fact that they’ve got with the recyclable glass version.

QOTD: I had to google it and found the marula. It looks like there are many uses for the bark of the tree too. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marula

How about we cut out the Portuguese wine talk for a while – I finally found a shop that carries quite a bit. I want to keep the prices down!

This has got to be the alltime wine~nerdiest ep EVER!… which ain’t neccesarily a bad thing.

So you asked her to give a “360 second” description of herself, and then, less than four seconds later, you interrupted her. That’s why I can’t watch your shows with the guests. I guess I’ll just have to assume that you are OK with screwcaps. For the past month or so, I haven’t even been clicking on the shows with guests, but this time I tried because of the screwcap topic, but it’s just gonna have to be “solo Gary V for me.”

Gar,

I agree to the tenth degree about wine snobs and there declaring so that the entire winery can hear them that a wine they just tasted is corked. They throw around the classic terms of funky, musty, tired, etc. My wife and I will just shake our heads because we just tasted the same wine from the same bottle and could not disagree with them more. We just don’t know how to counter their sour, pompous attitude. Any suggestions? BTW, great show, best one in a while…

i only drank one dao (monteiros is the winemaker/wineyard)?!). a cuvee of tinto roriz(tempranillo) and to autochtone grapes called touriga nacional and alfracheiro for 7,70 euro and you are right its worth more than double the prize… elegant fruity nice tannins and acic – balanced and komplex good integrated oak … could be interesting in some more years (was a 2003)!

and i really like ya guest shows(only if the guests are little bit into wine/not like these collegeboys/but iam a european, iam not into this type of humor) great wishes supPORT PORTugal leif

Question: first episode with a cut … it was such a nice discussion!

Liked the show–don’t grok the dissing on the guest. Who cares how she looks or her mannerisms–that’s just shallow. It was good to hear some give and take instead of an echo chamber.

One other thing I don’t quite grok is the screw cap “reduction” thing. How many wines come with the plastic or foil wrapper around the top nowadays? I’m not in any way informed on the issue, but my hunch would be that this drastically limits the the wine’s ability to breathe.

Synthetic corks, on the other hand…the worst of both worlds, IMO.

Love your show, but either tell your guests to learn chemistry or keep it off the show. Your guest had no idea what she was talking about in saying that “screw caps caused reduction flavors”.

In chemistry an oxidative reaction is one in which an element(most commonly this is best understood in metals like iron where oxidation is called “rust” where atoms leave the metallic state and the metal deteriorates)loses electrons and becomes a positivly charged ion. An oxidation process cannot take place without a simultaneous reduction (a gain of electrons)process.

To say that a plastic covered screw cap causes reduction is ignorant pop science.

GREAT episode!!! Got to be one of my most all time favoritest. The conversation really clicked, AND it was interesting. AAAaand educational. Bonus!

Quite shocking that Gary can’t detect TCA very well. I see corked wines almost every day and it is absurd to think it is 1 in 2500 or whatever. The cork industry is doing a great deal to reduce this number and they are succeeding. Just ten years ago there was probably 10 times more TCA in corks than there is today.

A+ episode!

Personal experience is quite in agreement with GV’s estimate of corked wine distribution. In 20+ years of daily wine consumption (let’s say order of 100 bottles per year) I have literally encountered one and only one clearly corked and thus badly spoiled wine. That gives an estimate of 1 per 2000, so close to GV’s… It was so distinct that I am sure I’d get even a less prominent effect, but than as Leftcoast mentions – my senses may not be tuned into it…
Interesting side note on consequences of corked wine: Even one single corked bottle have had a significant impact. Although I rationally understand how-and-why it have happened and I rationally know that the producer is of high esteem (it was Louis Latour wine) – I never could bring myself again to purchase any other of their products. And it have been about 7-8 years since…

Solid episode. GARY- I hate to disagree, but I am not 100% with you about corked wine percentages. In my experience of opening a hundred or two bottles per week at our wine bar & restaurant, I usually have to get credit for about a bottle every week or two. I smell and taste these wines myself, and not including the few bottles that are slightly off due to minor bottle variation, these one out of 100 or 200 are blatantly, truly, moldy newspaper-smelling and bitter corked! 2% IS high, but .5% or so in my experience is fairly accurate.
I DO agree, also from a buyer’s perspective, that wine reps, importers and distributors definitely over-play the “off bottle” card when the wine is simply not up to par. KEEP BREAKING WILLS!!!! ( I do the same thing and they hate it… until they realize that you’re right).

QOTD: I actually didn’t have to look this one up because I remember the Amarula liqueur that I used to serve at a dessert-centric restaurant a few years ago in Boston, made from the Marula fruit. Someone said “coffee” in the comments which I thought was a brilliant also-possibly-correct answer.

Solid episode. GARY- I hate to disagree, but I am not 100% with you about corked wine percentages. In my experience of opening a hundred or two bottles per week at our wine bar & restaurant, I usually have to get credit for about a bottle every week or two. I smell and taste these wines myself, and not including the few bottles that are slightly off due to minor bottle variation, these one out of 100 or 200 are blatantly, truly, moldy newspaper-smelling and bitter corked! 2% IS high, but .5% or so in my experience is fairly accurate.
I DO agree, also from a buyer’s perspective, that wine reps, importers and distributors definitely over-play the “off bottle” card when the wine is simply not up to par. KEEP BREAKING WILLS!!!! ( I do the same thing and they hate it… until they realize that you’re right).

QOTD: I actually didn’t have to look this one up because I remember the Amarula liqueur that I used to serve at a dessert-centric restaurant a few years ago in Boston, made from the Marula fruit. Someone said “coffee” in the comments which I thought was a brilliant also-possibly-correct answer.

great great great – this girl was so real. so knowledgeable, that many of the comments above do not acknowledge that she got GV excited.
You two went back & forth on topics, debating, agreeing, skipping to other topics. Really, who else knows all those Portuguese regions????
I had to hit pause and get out the Wine Atlas! And I scored very high on the CSW. You guys didn’t even skip a beat & started debating which region was best?!!!! Great & amazing.

I have switched from following scores ( helpful if you are new to wine – no doubt) to hating them. I really doubt the 90 point score. 94 and above – for some reason, I believe that. But the exact 90 – be afraid. It could be bought. Sort of like points on a mortgage. 87, 88, 89 gets to 90 or 91 if you buy advertising or are the EU guys landlord (check that out if you follow me).

Rough guest. sorry…

could it be amarula??