report of Clos St. Hune premox

originally posted by Claude Kolm:
originally posted by Jay Miller:
originally posted by Claude Kolm:
My friends in the UK wine trade are claiming that it is everywhere, reds included, but with a different manifestation for the reds. I'm not there, but some of the Burgundy producers are -- of course, it eases the pressure on them.
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How are they saying it manifests in reds?
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They say that it results in a muted, inexpressive wine. I don't see how they can distinguish that from low-level TCA, though. Furthermore, I open enough red Burgundy that has been cellared that I should be coming across it, too, and I have not been.
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Hmm, I've had a fair amount of '98 and '00 red Burgundy over the last few years and haven't really noticed that either. Interesting though.
 
FWIW, Jancis Robinson (a big lover of Trimbach riesling) commented a few years ago on tasting several bottles of inexplicably over the hill 2000 CFE. I only have it in half bottles but will try one sometime soonish.

Brad, did you get your 94 CFE from an internet based retailer in the midwest (my source - but I've not tried the wine and don't know how my bottles show).

oh, and Nathan - Brad's ineligibility to use the term "y'all" is demonstrated by his phrase "all y'all" - unless he's lecturing from the school of redundancy.

maureen
(who inexplicably drank 2000 bordeaux last night and enjoyed it! Pavillon Rouge, shared backstage with my favorite singer, Jonatha Brooke - coming soon to a town near you on the west coast - Eden, get to Largo or Canyon Club)
 
originally posted by maureen:
Brad, did you get your 94 CFE from an internet based retailer in the midwest (my source - but I've not tried the wine and don't know how my bottles show).
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Two bottles from Austin, two local.
 
Surely this is all an argument for moving to alternative closures?

There is no reason to suppose that red wines aren't affected by random oxidation, it's just harder to notice.
 
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
Jancis said recently that she often gets a rubber taste from screwcaps.
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Just a bit of reduction that more experience on the winemaker's part cures. The reduction seems to me to be lower from producers that have a few screwcap vintages under their belts (e.g. Strub).
 
I have read a lot about reductive aromas in screwcapped wines, but I've never tasted it, and I've tasted at least some reduction in many wines sealed with cork. (Many Alsatian wines, for example.)

There was a very good article about avoiding this problem during fermentation in the Wine Business Monthly recently. It certainly doesn't seem insuperable, and we know how many bottles cork ruins (without considering random oxidation).
 
originally posted by David M. Bueker:
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
Jancis said recently that she often gets a rubber taste from screwcaps.
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Just a bit of reduction that more experience on the winemaker's part cures. The reduction seems to me to be lower from producers that have a few screwcap vintages under their belts (e.g. Strub).
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Yes, she said the smell she picks up is due to reduction. Do you understand how this happens or is prone to happen with the screw tops?
 
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:

Yes, she said the smell she picks up is due to reduction. Do you understand how this happens or is prone to happen with the screw tops?
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Reduction is the opposite of oxidation. If a wine is sealed such that little to no oxygen gets in, it will eventually become reductive. This is why older bottles of wine so often (paradoxically) benefit from exposure to air, even though the benefits may not last terribly long.

Mark Lipton
 
Thanks, Mark, I've wanted to know more about reduction. But I've also read notes by, say, Allan Meadows, who speaks of wines tasting reductive out of barrel with the expectation that they will mend in bottle.
 
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
Thanks, Mark, I've wanted to know more about reduction. But I've also read notes by, say, Allan Meadows, who speaks of wines tasting reductive out of barrel with the expectation that they will mend in bottle.
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Because the bottling process exposes the wine to some degree of oxygen plus there's the mystical oxygen exchange through the cork (that cannot be accurately quantified).
 
screwcaps don't automatically equate to reduction. screwcaps can be ordered with various levels of permeability of the sealing surface that the wine is in contact with.

i tasted a local cabernet (walla) that had been in bottle for one year under screwcap using two different levels of screwcap permeability and already there was a detectable difference in the evolution of the wine. this was about four years ago. no doubt there's been loads of progress and understanding in this arena since then.
 
Mark,

If I understand correctly, oxidation is what we call the process of oxygen binding with sundry compounds present in the wine. Is there a similarly straightforward statement of what reduction is?
 
originally posted by Jeff Grossman:
Mark,

If I understand correctly, oxidation is what we call the process of oxygen binding with sundry compounds present in the wine. Is there a similarly straightforward statement of what reduction is?
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Most generally, oxidation involves the loss of electrons and reduction the gain thereof. In my little nook of chemistry (organic) we choose to view oxidation as the gain of oxygen or the loss of H2; reduction is the opposite. I hope that that's clear, but let me know if it ain't. I'll be up late tonight following election returns.

Mark Lipton
 
What sort of conditions would encourage the loss of O and the acquisition of H ?

Are those reactions exothermic? (I know a teeny bit of vocabulary....)
 
originally posted by Jay Miller:

Just read on another board that '97 and '99 Hune are showing premox issues:
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Not the 1997 CSH and CFE I know and have retasted this year (most recently the CFE last weekend). Haven't had either 1999 in a while, so can't comment on those.

Greetings from Switzerland, David.
_________________

J'ai gch vingt ans de mes plus belles annes au billard. Si c'tait refaire, je recommencerais. Roger Conti
 
originally posted by Jeff Grossman:
What sort of conditions would encourage the loss of O and the acquisition of H ?

Are those reactions exothermic? (I know a teeny bit of vocabulary....)
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It all depends on what is reacting. Nitrogen, to take a f'rinstance, fails to react with oxygen because that reaction wouldn't be exothermic. In wine, the phenolics are all susceptible to oxidation. If oxygen is present, it will react with the phenolics (removing H2); if no oxygen is present, sulfites will serve as the oxidant instead, resulting in formation of the sulfides and thiols that are characteristic of a reductive wine.

Mark Lipton
 
Thanks, Mark. Are there conditions under which the phenolic material will be relatively inert (and not demand to react with anything that happens to be handy)?
 
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