To Cork Or Not to Cork

Another wine related book by George Taber who has gained famed and notoriety within the wine industry through his series of books and retrospective stories about the Judgment of Paris in which American (Napa Valley to be exact) wineries were rated as better wines than their French counterparts.In this work Taber works to examine one of the most commonly misunderstood aspects of wine. A huge majority of wine stoppers are made from cork, a natural soft malleable wood that works incredibly well at sealing wine for a few short months, or even for centuries.The problem with cork is that in some percentage (the actual percentage is open to great debate) of wine the cork imparts a tiny amount of a chemical called TCA, which causes wine (no matter the quality) to smell musty and taste musty as well. The average wine drinker will consider a wine spoiled if TCA reaches five parts per thousand while a trained, professional taster will notice it at two or three parts per thousand. Many w
ines have one part per thousand occurring naturally in the wine itself, so any impart by the cork is cause for great concern.After laying out the problem at hand, Taber goes on to explain some of the history behind cork itself (made in Portugal, with twenty five percent of the international market controlled by one family owned corporation) as well as the attempts at creating a viable alternative. Alternatives currently being produced include synthetic cork (which has its own problems including basically being a plastic and non environmentally friendly product) or even a screw top. Screw tops have been adopted by many famous vintners in places such as Australia, but have yet to take hold in either the United States or France. To some, they take away some of the elegance and mystique of wine, while allowing (depending on the manufacturer) either too much oxygen into the bottle, or not enough.If you're interested in wine and an interesting look behind the scenes of a huge, mul
tinational industry, George Taber's To Cork or Not to Cork is both an interesting and thought provoking read.

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