I have a shipment, via UPS, which attempted delivery twice this week while no one was home. I’ve now requested that they hold it for pickup at the DC, but won’t be able to pick it up until Friday.
Unfortunately, I think the wine may have been exposed to freezing temperatures while out for delivery / sitting overnight in our neighborhood holding locker. When I pick up on Friday, any suggestions on how I can check for possible damage? I’ve heard that protruding corks can be a sign…any others? TIA.
Given that wine does not freeze at all until well below 32 (more like 22 or lower depending on alcohol level) it seems highly unlikely there is any issue.
The only risk from cold is that the wine freezes, which will push the cork and compromise (or destroy) the seal. So any damage from the cold will be obvious, unlike heat damage which can lack obvious visual indications.
Cold can also cause tartrates to precipitate out, which can be visible in whites, but it is primarily a cosmetic issue. Freezing wine can lower the acidity, but a frozen wine will be obvious because the cork will push or the bottle will break, as water is less dense as a solid than as a liquid and expands when it freezes.
I’ve had Oregon Pinot that got cold enough to precipitate out tartrates. I found the wine flat and lacking energy—not how I remembered it at the winery. If my experience is indicitive, I would worry about that. The tartrates/precipitate is easy to see in the wine.
(I’m presuming the precipitate is tartrate. I have no way of knowing for sure).
Thanks Mike. These are actually Cabernets, for what it’s worth.
On a related note, I recently opened a few bottles of chardonnay where the corks came out of the bottle with very little effort. Too easily. The wine was clearly damaged when I smelled and tasted it, but there was no sign of seepage as far as I can tell. I contacted the winery who is replacing the bottles. Thoughts on what may have caused this?
In this example, do you think the wine was well below the freezing point? We’ve had some odd weather here in TX recently, where it’s gotten just below freezing at night, and then back up to the low 70s in the day. I can’t imagine those wild swings good for the wine.
No evidence the wine froze. No pushed corks. This was a few years ago when I lived in VA so the wine was probably exposed to 20’s at night and 40’s in daytime. Midwest may have be colder, don’t recall for sure.
First of all the wine does not move in temp at the same speed as the weather. It’s in a shipper which dampens the swings (there have been many threads on this, including some with temp probe data).
Corks coming out too easily sounds like a poor fit between the cork and the bottle, and a poor seal would explain why the wine was damaged. I understand that variability in the diameter of the necks of bottles from some vendors has been an issue in recent years.
Scott - Mike has it right. This sounds like a cork/seal issue, not temperature-related. I would just add that it could also be a cork quality issue. Some corks are less pliable and don’t reexpand as much after being compressed on the bottling line.
Most cork companies test their corks for moisture before sending them to customers. Most usually have a range in which they find the corks acceptable - too dry and the corks will be too brittle and difficult to get into and out of bottles and too moist and they won’t hold a seal. This certainly might have happened in the case you’re talking about - but it also good have been a situation where there was too much paraffin on the cork, or that the bottle had residue on the inside that allowed for the corks to be removed so easily. Too many variables to be sure . . .
As far as tartrates precipitating out and a wine being ‘flat’, that’s an interesting observation. The shift in pH and acidity during cold stability for most wines is fairly minor and usually is not easily detectable. Just another data point.
I don’t know enough about this to speak with authority. Just subjective observation. The wine in question was ‘11 Oregon Pinot. There was >6mos of time between tasting the shipped bottles and tasting at the winery. I could all be in my head,but in comparison 2012’s shipped the following year seemed more energetic and “acidic” in a riper lower acidity vintage.
Also having to stand these bottles up for a few days to let the significant amount of precipitation settle was very annoying.