Garage Winemaking in South Africa Less is More - Cape Wine ...

This is a quick and efficient way of attaching your labels as well as your certification
stickers to the bottles.
Closures
The much debated issue of the best way to seal a bottle of wine is one which
causes endless discussion in the wine industry. Wine closures keep the wine inside
the bottle and keep most oxygen out to prevent spoilage. The traditional and still
most widely used for high end wine is cork. This is derived from the bark of the cork
oak which is found mainly in Portugal and Spain. Corks advantages, besides
tradition, are it is an effective insulating medium against heat, cold and vibration, as
well as being impervious to liquids. Cork is also a vegetable product, free of toxic
ingredients and does not impart taste or odour or cause deterioration of the wine
unless it has been contaminated by fungi or bacteria of some kind. This brings us to
the disadvantages. The high rates of cork taint from TCA are causing wine producers
to look elsewhere. Generally 5% of your wine can end up corked from spoiled corks,
which is an economic loss. The other issue is that the uneducated consumer does
not know the wine is tainted by the cork and just thinks your wine doesn‟t taste very
nice and therefore does not buy another bottle. Another disadvantage is once the
bottle is opened it is difficult to reseal effectively. Cork is also prone to shrinkage.
Corked bottles must also be stored flat to keep wine in contact with the cork so it
doesn‟t dry out. This can be a problem in stores and during transport. Corks are sold
by numerous companies and come in various sizes and price brackets. 106
Notwithstanding the romantic view in favour of cork, most of the newly developed
closures which are not necessarily natural or aesthetically pleasing are definitely
more efficient in hermetically protecting the wine, and they are also easier to reseal
the bottle. Man made closures are also non perishable, lend no flavour to the wine,
are not susceptible to shrinkage, and are cheaper to produce. 107
Synthetic corks are made from plastic materials either by a co-extrusion process
where an inner core fills a second outer, small surface, or by polymer injection. The
largest problem with synthetic corks is the greater transfer of oxygen into the bottle,
which oxidises the wine. They also tend to get stuck in the bottle neck and lots of
corkscrews struggle to get them out. 108
Vino-seal is a glass closure which sits on a synthetic O-ring and is held in place
by a removable aluminium cap. Looks gorgeous and works wonderfully, but at ten
rand a closure you better hope for the double gold. 109
Screw caps are closures made from aluminium that threads on to the bottleneck.
These closures require special bottles. Concerns with screw cap are reductiveness
in the bottle. Reduction involves the development of sulphur aromas due to the lack
of oxygen. Most garagistes concentrate on red wines which are made in a more
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