For those who don’t read Portuguese here’s the summary:
Back in October 2020, Sogape/Casa da Ferreirinha started to release the 2011 vintage of Barca Velha to critics for review. Only to find a high incidence of cork breakage across those bottles. They ended up not releasing the 2011 vintage at that time and recorking the entire 2011 Barca Velha vintage after inspecting each bottle and cork for TCA. 30k 75cl bottles and some 2.6k magnums. Now all resealed with NDTech natural corks by Amorim.
How does a producer go through that experience and still decide to continue using natural cork as a closure?
I confess my query might have been a bit more hyperbolic than warranted. Nothing wrong with supporting local industry. And the relationship between Amorim and Guedes families is a longstanding one in Portugal. It makes sense that they’d each want to support each other. I’m not complaining about that, it’s not like Amorim is lacking in alternatives to natural cork in their portfolio of products though. That’s what I was getting into it.
Not that it really matters, but I think an argument could be made that given its size, Corticeira Amorim is much more of a global company than part of the ‘local’ industry. It’s like saying you want to support the local economy and doing your shopping at your local Walmart. Technically be true, but it kinda misses the point a bit.
Also, again, not that it matters, Portugal is also a much smaller market for Amorim corks. Europe-ex Portugal is ~62.6% of sales, US is ~17.4%, Portugal is ~7%.
As I said, my main thing is trying to understand how someone wouldn’t want to start looking at alternative closures given the scale of the undertaking that happened with natural cork. Plus, it’s not like Sogrape seal all their wines with natural cork. Plenty of wines in their portfolio use alternative closures, so it’s not like Sogrape are strangers to alternative closures.
If I were to venture a guess, I think the more likely scenario is that Sogrape and Amorim decided to use this opportunity to have some more publicity around Amorim’s NDTech corks and they came to a mutual agreement. After all there are plenty of vested interests in not wanting people to move away from natural cork to alternative closures. But this is just pure speculation on my end.
My father was at the original release event of 2011 Barca Velha (one of three in consecutive days, I believe) and gave the wine a perfect score; apparently it’s mindblowing. The news that the whole production would be recorked came as a huge shock to everyone. I couldn’t read the article because of the pay wall, but I do wonder what type of cork was initially used, since Amorim are known to have invested millions in TCA preventing technology.
Thanks for the insights Tomas. I sent you the full article in a PM. They didn’t note which cork they used originally. Though the article does note the opted to change the diameter of the corks for the rebottling, from 26mm to 24mm. Would be interesting to hear from winemaker on the board on what impact cork diameter has on the wine
I don’t believe the cork diameter has anything to do with the wine; just with the bottleneck for their glass. That they were originally using 26mm width corks looks odd to me.
I’ve not read the article, nor seen the bottle in question, but 26mm corks would be recommended for a bottle with an opening slightly bigger than 18.5mm or with an unusual flare in the bottleneck. I would have expected a recorking to go the opposite way, from 24 to 26, if the size was an issue.
According to the complete article, which Rodrigo sent me, the problem that led to the withdrawal of all bottles and postponement of the wine’s commercial release was actually the ease with which the corks broke upon extraction. All the bottles were then recorked (using a nitrogen injecting needle, assembly line style) with Amorim’s NDtech cork, which is 100% guaranteed against TCA and did not exist back in 2011 (Barca Velha spends 8 years in the bottle before being released). In this process six tainted bottles were found.
Yep, Tomas is correct. Just noticed Jancis Robinson also wrote about it on her site for those looking to read about it in English.
Larry and Tom- answer your question apparently they detected 6 TCA tainted bottles, out of roughly 30k bottles tested, which is a really a super small incidence rate overall.
Adolfo- relevant passage translated from the article: “This time around, they opted to use 24mm corks instead of 26mm used during the original bottling, to reduce risk and because they considered it unnecessary to subject the wines to too much pressure.”
Tom- no you didn’t. At first read of the article I thought the issue was mostly with TCA. Rereading the Brazilian article and other sources it became clearer the issue was mostly with cork integrity, not TCA. I’ve since edited my original post to reflect the correct information.
Larry- a bit of gold from the Jancis Robinson article that made me think of you: “Neither Guedes nor Sottomayor took a breath before politely declining my suggestion that screwcaps might have been better.” Looks like screwcaps still have a long way to go unfortunately
Also worth noting, Tomas mentioned to me that his dad was at the initial release and noted that the 2011 was the best Barca Velha vintage he tasted. Unfortunately out of my normal price range. Tomas-any insights into how to join Clube Reserva 1500? I’d love to be able to buy Barca Velha at €200 instead of €600
It’s a very select club and I have no idea whether you can join without an invitation or not, but in any case it is likely dependent on making significant regular purchases, so I wouldn’t count on it as a quick way into discounted Barca Velha.
This is a translation of my father’s tasting note, so far unpublished for the reasons we’ve been discussing here (you didn’t read this here!). It struck him as more outwardly expressive in its youth than the comparatively austere '08 ('07 Reserva Especial may have been a more evident candidate for the Barca Velha label), but with an equal or greater sense of structure. This was his second ever perfect score in his entire reviewing career, after the 1927 Real Companhia Velha Colheita.
Deep ruby. Fine, elegant black fruit, subtle vanilla pod, bergamot, spices in multiple dosage, a bit of smoke, but with the fruit always absolutely in the foreground. The palate distinguishes itself by enormous volume, immense structure, layered flavors. The texture is silky and sophisticated, with firm tannins, soft and harmoniously integrated, joined by beautiful, long lasting acidity - the guarantee of long years of bottle aging. A wine without edges, perfect and monumental.
Thank you for the clarification - so it sounds as if the corks may have been too brittle, which would leave me to believe that either they were too dry when put in originally or dried out during storage of the bottles. Interesting.
Barca Velha has always been a premium wine from Portugal and a lot goes into making it a wine of arguably uncompromising quality. Honestly, I’ve not heard of another producer who decides to pull all wines being offered to recork them to ensure their long term integrity. How much of that translates into making the wine worth $700 is hard to say and likely depends on who purchases it.
I do buy a fair bit of Portuguese wines, but I don’t think it’s at the level required by the club. Plus, I’d then need to figure out how to get all of those purchases to the US from Portugal. Probably a very good club and more worthwhile trying to join if you’re in Portugal. I’d imagine the events and tastings they hold are also very high quality.
For now I’ll have to try tracking down a few bottles of ’07 Reserva Especial given your comment
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