Recently purchased some wine (2004 Aubert Ritchie) from a third party who agreed to ship on a Monday but shipped on Tuesday late so it actually only left his location on Wednesday.

Instead of getting the wine by Friday, it arrived on Monday in Las Vegas where one has a badly pushed cord (about 3mm) and another has a slightly pushed cork.

How badly do you think the wine has been damaged? Long-term, I'm sure it would not last, but I was wondering what the short-term effects may be?

Any ideas?

Thanks,
Rob

I think that your short term damage would be revealed mostly by leakage, and not by the pushed cork. In a perfect world, with a perfect seal, expansion would make the cork rise up, but the liquid would not escape, and oxygen would not seep in. The wine would have been heated beyond optimal temperature to be sure, but not oxidized. In an imperfect world, the pushed cork breaks the tight seal and you get leakage and oxidation. Check for leakage. Pushed cork with no leakage is suboptimal, but not fatal. Leakage is fatal for long term survival. Any leakers should be consumed short term, or sold to Serge.

I rec'd a couple of cases of 2004 Aubert (for several people) direct from the winery and some of the corks appeared to be slightly depressed. I would contact Aubert to see if they have noticed this as well.

Thanks for the replies.

As clarification, the corks are pushed out, not pushed in. There is clearly some leakage, but not a lot.

I suppose that I can make a big deal about it and give this guy a negative rating, but I will probably just move on, drink these first and save the one's I purchased direct from Aubert.

Rob

The temperature required to push the corks depends strongly on the original fill, very full bottles can move the corks with only a slight excursion in temperature. If the temperature excursion was large enough, I would worry more about the damage from the heat than from extra oxygen. This assumes that the cork hasn't become a constant leaker (most young corks don't) and that the fill hasn't dropped a significant amount (ie, lots of leakage). I think oxygen is more of a problem with repeated temperature cycling.

Heat can burn off volatiles, accelerate undesirable reactions (by factors much larger than the increase in oxygen exposure), and cause bacterial reactions to take off if the wine isn't totally clean. There are lots of heat damaged wines that don't smell oxidized. They just aren't what they would have been. ie less fresh, less aromatic, more undesirable odors and flavors.

Also, I think the buyer and seller share responsibility for deciding how and when to ship. There are costs and risk trade-offs that I think are more appropriately made by the buyer.

-Al

I think we should have an offline with "leakers" only.

did you mean bottles or "over 90"?

Quote:

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I think we should have an offline with "leakers" only.

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An off-line for incontinents?

either one is fine with me.

darn, you are a true connoseur of "golden oldies"!

Define "short term?" One of the bottles I schlepped home this past week leaked a little bit. The fill level was/still is incredibly high. Bottle is an 04 Pinot. From your experience, are we talking "open tomorrow," can it wait a month, six?

Anyone else?

I experienced my first pushed cork this weekend...

I bought a bottle of 2001 Bordeaux, perfect condition from the store, and accidentally left it in the car for a few hours. When I looked at the bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag, I noticed some wine leakage at the top on the brown paper. I examined the cork and it looked slightly protruded.

I am drinking it within 7 days...