Question Time With Empty

It's a good simple and concise question that John Wilson summed up recently by pointing out had we always used Stelvin we would never move to cork, yet is the answer really that simple? Having sat down to do a blind tasting of a wine Shane had left, I was presented with a dull and dead nose and a palate of harsh acidity... A fault no less, the blind tasting had been oxidised. Provoked by this and indeed the impending arrival of guests and Shane himself, I decided while the topic was hot and many opinions could be had, that I ought to crack open a pair of wines I had picked up in The Corkscrew Wine Merchants on Dublin's Chatham Street. What was so interesting about this? They were both the same vintage no less and to boot one was under cork and the other under Stelvin. 

Having cracked the wines open, we give a little sniff to attempt to figure out which of our little wines would be the more delicate and as such first to fill the ISO (and given our luck on the blind, to check that all was in order). Having done this rather simple task Team Empty moved that the cork sealed wine go first. No sooner had the wine been poured did discord among the troops emerge. With one member of the posse mumbling as to Mourvedre's normal role as a blending grape. However he was left alone on this one, as the four other tasters noses could scarcely be drawn from the glasses they occupied. Here is how it all panned out.

d'Arenberg, Twenty-Eight Road Mourvedre, 2006 - McLaren Vale (PP >€20.00 Genuinely on offer @ €11.95)  (Under Cork): Intially things here started off a little slow, progressively wakening up into a dark autumn fruit nose of blackberry with hints of blueberry. Characteristically earthy tones defining the wine with touches of undergrowth and truffle in the distance on the palate the fruit and earth followed up the nose, with some very fine tannin and good acidity. The finish was full of red spices and dried fruits like dates, a soft lingering mint and faint dark chocolate lingered on a long finish. Things very looking good for the cork sealed wine. Then, having moved on to the Stelvin sealed wine and having returned to the cork things changed, the wine had suddenly gotten a whole lot better. Everything had seemingly sat down and decided they couldn't let the side down. The palate and nose became effortlessly integrated, working perfectly, with the strawberry that you expect finally rearing its head and dancing in an effortless and funky tango with the acidity and blackberry notes to form a slight autumn meets summer bramble. The wine didn't sit still mind you either, a tobacco laced with sweet spices wove its way into the picture next. Needless to say the wine is in it's sweet spot, and if you have some, while it will go further, it would be a shame to miss it's current state (Value 4.5)

d'Arenberg, Twenty-Eight Road Mourvedre, 2006 - McLaren Vale (PP >€20.00 Genuinely on offer @ €11.95)  (Under Stelvin): Even the colour here revealed a little more life to the wine, just having achieved a fresh ruby compared to the ruby-garnet of the cork sealed wine. Yet, the nose was the first place we noticed a remarked difference. Freshness poured out of this wine's metaphorical ears. Were this wine a person you'd hate it for the envy it instilled in you of the life and energy that it personified. One term bandied across the table was it was like the cork enclosed  wine two years in the past. So, we were time travelling! As soon as slight sulphur tinge had clear we were paradoxically beaten over the head and elegantly offered strawberries, earth, a more pungent fresh herbaceous nose of eucalyptus. The palate was no different, fresh, juicy and abundant fruit dominated, with strawberry, raspberry, menthol, a good spice with strong tannin and acidity keeping everything at once together and fluid. I hate the use of the term but Mocha. Mocha dominated the peripherals of the long lingering and persistent finish. The spices began to develop and clean, becoming an almost white pepper. These were clearly the same grape, the same vintage, the same producer, but distinctly different wines. (Value 4.5)

(Shane's note, it wasn't a slight tinge of sulphur, it was a bang of it. Thankfully this has disappeared almost completely from later vintages of d'Arenberg wines). 

Answers, we all want answers! 

In life I suppose we all want some quick fire answer that sums up the verdict so we can repeat and re-use the information without thinking too much. Yet, wine is a little too ambiguous and for that.

So what do I think? Well, first both wines were fantastic, very different, surprisingly so too. The Cork sealed wine, had a character to it, with the tertiary flavours that make older wines so interesting both on nose an palate, but caution, this is not really that old at six years. Where the Stelvin is involved however it's very clear that the wine is still very fresh, it is going nowhere in a rush.

Which did I prefer? Slightly ironically given what is about to follow, but the cork enclosed wine, it had developed, it had more layers and elegance. Yet this said the Stelvin sealed wine will inevitably pick these flavours up, and thanks to the slower ageing process it is likely to pick up a lot more in the mean time too.

Technically speaking the Stelvin enclosure is going to go the distance and get the most out of the wine, and I think that were this tasting to happen in another five years the cork closure will have seen its day and will most likely have faded beyond recognition and the tasting notes for the Stelvin will read closer and finer than the cork wine at this current junction in time, yet, I may be wrong,  Bordeaux Chateaux,  Pichon-Longueville have begun the process of ageing their finer wines under both cork and Stelvin and they will most likely provide the real game changer in whether cork stays or not, but don't expect that result any time soon, it'll be around twenty years before we get the answers that they are trying to provide.

I would also caution this article as a subjective and qualitative review of the question, like it is really only one wine, that will react to ageing with a completely different set of results to many others.

What I still found interesting was the favourite votes, 2v2 before I weighed in with a cautioned hedonists vote for cork. It just goes to show the answer is that there really is no answer... not yet anyway. Thanks for reading guys.