of real cork or plastic?

     

It all depends on your point of view.  The traditional cork has been sealing glass bottles since the 17^th century and is thus a tradition, know-how and acquired experience all in one.  Thanks to the precious cork, old bottles have been preserved and tasted, to the great happiness of wine-lovers.

 But just imagine: you’ve been saving this one precious bottle for your wedding anniversary, the candle-lit dinner has got under way, and you carefully open your famous bottle – oh, the disappointment, it’s horribly corked and can’t be drunk!  Like me, you have unfortunately been in this ridiculous position.  I work all year long to produce wines that I’m proud of, and I just hate to find one of my bottles spoiled by the insidious taste of cork or by noticeable oxidation of the wine, brought on because the bottle was not perfectly sealed.

 That’s why I decided to solve this problem once and for all by using synthetic corks, which have no taste to impart to the wine.  What I require of a cork is to seal the bottle airtight, and never– heaven forbid! – change the taste of the wine.  They have other advantages – they are easy to pull, they never break and they never leave any bits in the wine.  I know that using plastic corks might hurt the feelings of traditionalists, but, believe you me, I have chosen this way simply to avoid any problems.

 I hope you will agree that I have made the right choice.

 About one bottle per case is likely to be corked

 It is widely recognised that 6-8% of all bottles opened throughout the world have this defect, to an average value which falls within the range of 0.6-12% (report of the wine and spirit association in the United Kingdom, published 22 May 2001, on the results of sampling 5,735 bottles).  There are many reasons why the percentage of this particular fault cannot be accurately estimated.  Tasters define differently the taste of cork.  Some say that it is a clear smell of mould, while others hold that the mere attenuation of the aromatic intensity of a wine may be due to contamination by the cork.  Also, some tasters are more sensitive than others.

 Preserving the fruitiness of a wine

 What we at Pierre Gaillard want most of all is to have you taste our wines and appreciate them.  That’s why we’ve chosen to use plastic corks for some of our wines.  They have many good points:

-                    all these corks are made of industry-standard plastic, approved by all the public authorities;

-                    they possess neither smell nor taste;

-                    they do not break or crumble up into the bottle, when you pull them; and

-                    they preserve wine without any risk of oxidation, so that it keeps the same freshness and fruitiness that it had when it was bottled.

 We hope that you will look favourably on our decision.  Please do not hesitate to let us have any comments you have, and to raise any questions about this matter which we might not have answered already.