Drinking wines from various sources, stores, auction, home cellar and offsite storage i am finding the wines stored from release to drinking in perfect offsite conditions are significantly better. They seem fresher and corks are perfect, the wines just seem better
I would agree that clean wines and perfect corks make a difference. After that, it comes down to luck.
People spend a fortune on ‘perfect storage’ to think they’re in control, if either of the two aforementioned are not what they need to be, then they’re not in control, at all.
I would guess that many people on this site have had impeccably stored perfect looking bottles and corks but the wine is still flawed. No guarantees with wine. Less-than-perfect storage will certainly heighten flaws but isn’t the only factor.
I think this is one of those situations where on the surface, I would agree in the sense that the best possible showing of a wine will be in a situation where it was stored best from the get-go. This also implies that during shipping, the wine was not compromised.
I think we can all look to situations where we have tried bottles that others have been highly enthusiastic about but our experiences have been different. And I have to believe a lot of that has to do with provenance.
Of course, that also can be a result of differences in oxidation rates with different corks.
There are so many variables at play here, but again, I agree with the general premise but would remove the word perfect.
The best wines I have encountered are those from temperature controlled cellars with high humidity. If you are a neat freak, don’t bother; the labels are usually badly stained, often barely legible, with bits falling off etc. But it’s amazing how little ullage there usually is, and the wines have great clarity and color.
Is anyone here really indifferent to wine storage conditions? Demanding 100% perfect results before accepting the premise that storage matters is just arguing for the sake of arguing, IMO.
Yesterday I tasted through 7 vintages of Copain Brosseau Chard from '09-'16 and 9 vintages of Copain Kiser “En Haut” Pinot Noir dating back to 2003 at the winery where they have been stored in the perfect environment from bottling to tasting.
I’ve tasted some of the same wines over the years where provenance was un-known or less than what these bottles had. There are distinct differences. I’m not talking about flawed bottles, because a flaw is there from bottling, but storage related issues. Such as oxidation, heat stress, bricking, advanced aging characteristics.
As a general rule I answer yes to the OP.
I have a friend who has many overlapping wines that we both enjoy.
When he moved to San Francisco, he rented a U-Haul truck to move his wine, loaded it one night in Southern California, and began his trek up interstate 5 towards the bay area. Somewhere north of Fresno, his truck broke down and he was stuck there for almost 2 days. The ambient temperatures outdoors were above 90 to 95°.
This was in 1995.
To this day, we can open the same wines taken from his stash and mine and the differences are immediately obvious. There was only one brief issue with “storage conditions” that were different in these wines lives.
When he brings out one on the ‘storage conditions’ wines, his wife laughs and says, “Ooh, serving some spaghetti sauce?”
Blech the “Prove It!” thing as a knee jerk reaction always falls flat to me. It’s over-applied skepticism. When “Prove It!” is the FIRST reaction to something, it says to me that you’re too far along that disbelief spectrum and not valuing subjectivity enough.
(Sidenote: The area empiricists struggle in most is love. How the hell do you prove love? It must not exist. Where are the concrete figures and data?)
Human experience, while inconsistent in many ways, does count for something. Especially in something that’s completely based on perception: a human’s experience of wine when consumed! We are not trying to establish a priori truth in a vacuum here. It’s about whether people generally notice a difference between crappily-stored wines and perfectly stored ones. Actually, the thread title DOES open this up for attack because if it were worded “Perfect storage makes a difference to how it smells and tastes to you, agree?” then we are acknowledging that this is a subjective discussion. So Markus has a point there, and there alone, imo.
What’s appropriate to the discussion of whether WE perceive a difference is an OPINION, since it is the only valid thing in a subjective discussion. Seeking some iron clad certainty like a Q.E.D. math theorem is barking up the wrong tree here.
If I offered to sell you your favorite expensive wine for $X dollars, stored ‘perfectly’ as per common convention, or $X - $10 stored at 85 degrees and low humidity upright for years which would you choose? And why?
It doesn’t matter because on WineBid it will say “Removed from a temperature and humidity controlled wine cellar/storage unit; Purchased upon release; Consignor is original owner”