Our Interview with Andrew Jefford

Andrew Jefford, the renowned British wine writer, recently wrote an interesting and somewhat controversial piece on screwcaps as a closure for wine. Below is a link to that article

http://www.decanter.com/news/blogs/expert/530537/jefford-on-monday-the-total-experience

Interested and intrigued by Jefford’s views on screwcaps, as well as being keen to talk more broadly about wine with the man, the RedtoBrown team flew over to France to interview him at his abode in Languedoc.

Upon arrival we were warmly greeted by Jefford, and the conversation soon flowed over a glass of local wine and across many a wine subject, including his views on the evolution of terroir driven wines in Australia. Having talked for half an hour, we came to one of our key questions -

R2B: And Andrew now to question that everyone wants to know, what was the main point you wanted to make comparing screwcaps and corks and framing it in terms of the “total wine experience”?

Jefford: Well, first and foremost I wanted to argue against the view of many, particularly in your country Australia, that screwcaps are the superior closure and that is the end of the story. I think it’s more complicated than that, and indeed I think that cork, both in terms of what it says about a winemaker, as well as the variation that corks brings to the way a wine tastes, provides a greater and more engaged wine experience

R2B: But . . .

Jefford: Take this bottle of white burgundy here . . . a Corton Charlemagne from Bonneau du Matray. Look at that distinct yellow closure . . . so much more appealing than the uniformity of bottles under screwcap. And then! The excitement now as we open this grand cru burgundy . . . would you like a glass?

R2B: Very kind of you (thinking to ourselves hell yeah!)

                            (Look at me. I'm so much sexier than a screwcap)

Jefford: What’s this wine going to taste like? Every wine is always different, and with each day a wine evolves, but with cork the possibilities and variation are even more endless.

(Jefford then pops the cork)

And that beautiful sound of pulling the cork . . . aghhh . . . I’ve got a semi already

R2B: What?

Jefford: Nothing, nothing. Here you go. What do you think?

We collectively stick our noses into our glasses of Corton Charlemagne and our hearts sink . . . it appears to be corked. The palate only confirms the nose. Looking beyond this, the quality of the wine is undoubted, but ultimately it’s not something that can be enjoyed with that level of taint.

We politely broach the possibility with Jefford that the wine is corked . . .

Jefford: yes, sadly it is. But that’s ok. This wine has had a unique life, and we must celebrate what it has become. Like all god’s children.

R2B: But what’s to celebrate when a $150 wine is not drinkable?

Jefford: The total wine experience

R2B: The total wine experience?

Jefford: Why yes! From beginning to end. There’s the excitement when I received the sample. The mulling over when I should drink it, and whether I should taste it in amongst the other Corton Charlemagne samples I had received, or perhaps in a line up of Grand Cru samples I had received across all appellations. And then just now, the surprise and excitement I gave both myself and you when I decided to spontaneously open it!

R2B: Ok . . . and is that it? Does the total wine experience end when you pour your corked grand cru burgundy down the sink?

Jefford: No no no! There’s so much more!

R2B: Really? How so?

At this point Jefford jumped out of his seat and started doing a vinous interpretive dance . . . think bud burst as interpreted by Peter Garrett. This confusing performance continued for a little while before we were taken aback when he suddenly took off his shirt and started pouring the Corton Charlemagne over himself

Jefford: Come join me boys! The total wine experience. Oh yeah!

We started backing out of the room. We weren’t sure where this total wine experience was going, and the crazed look in Jefford’s eyes didn’t encourage us to stay around to find out

Jefford: Don’t you see! Don’t you see! Watch where the cork goes . . .

R2B: Let’s bail

Jefford: You Australian screwcap zealots! You’ll never know the total wine expeeeeeeeeriennnnce!!!!!!

Our last sight of Jefford as we hightailed it out of there was of him on his knees before a map of the vineyards of burgundy pouring the last of the Bonneau du Matray over himself . . .

Cork. To buy or not to buy . . .

The Cork vs Screwcap debate is a well trodden path within wine circles. If it’s not apparent from what I have written then I am very firmly in the screwcap camp. Eschewing all the real and pseudo debates in this area, my reason for being pro-screw cap is very, very simple. I literally cannot remember the last time I opened a screwcap sealed wine that had a closure issue. That doesn’t mean it can’t happen, but in reality it’s few and far between. Unfortunately I can’t say the same about cork. I reckon my cork issue rate is at least 10%. That is, at least 1 in 10 cork sealed wines that I consume (or at least attempt to) have some sort of issue. Very mild TCA, obvious TCA, and oxidation are all issues I encounter all too often.

And yes, wines under screwcap age. I’ve had numerous 5 year through to 13 year old screwcap wines, and they are aging wonderfully. People who argue otherwise may as well be arguing that the earth is flat.

All of which leads me to an ongoing dilemma of mine. Whether to purchase cork sealed wines or not? Firstly, I do buy cork sealed wines. Possibly my favourite wine is Barolo, and therefore there’s no avoiding purchasing cork closures there at this stage (though the first good Barolo producer that uses screwcap will win my hard earned).

My issue, however, is more in Australia, where screwcap is now the dominant closure and no one bats an eyelid when opening a screwcap wine. It has become the norm. Despite this, there remains wineries that continue to use cork, and predominantly these are for premium wines. Whereas you’d struggle to find a $20 Australian wine under cork nowadays, jump up to $50 or more, and they are far more prevalent. Of course this seems to me entirely counterintuitive. Making a premium product and sealing it with a closure that has a higher failure rate doesn’t make much sense to me.

In any case, at these price points you get some of the more interesting and desirable Australian wines. Often single site wines that represent a winemaker’s best efforts. It might be, for example, a Pinot Noir that I love the sound of. With the wonderful development of Pinot in this country in the past two decades, however, there is more than just one $50+ Pinot that I lust after. They are now numerous, and with a monthly wine budget that I try to be reasonably disciplined about (not always successfully), unfortunately I can’t purchase all of them and therefore have to make decisions. As a result, a wine’s closure has become a key factor in helping me decide what wine I buy. I might be trying to make a decision between two exciting Victorian Pinot producers. If one is under screwcap and the other under cork, then that will make my decision a much easier one.

Now, if a winery wants to bottle their wine under cork for historical, romantic, or export reasons I can completely understand this. But why not give consumers a choice? Bottle half under cork and half under screwcap. If people still want to buy wine under cork they can, but I’d of thought that within Australia at least the screwcap allocation will sell out a lot more quickly than cork. Moreover, doing this consistently over say a decade or so, would enable a winery to genuinely determine which closure is the best for their wine. Quite often when I ask a winemaker why they are still using cork (in a polite manner), I get a somewhat testy and emotional response. Now I’m all for passion and emotion in wine, but in this instance I’d rather hear a response along the lines “We bottled a small batch of wines under screwcap for 5 years, and at the end of it, we still found cork to be the better closure for our wines”. Even if I still might disagree, I’d respect this response a lot more than the throw away lines you normally get.

Greatness in any field involves leaving no stone unturned. Not at the very least exploring how screwcap works with your wine, is a step back from this endeavour.


Red