July 25, 2005
more stormhoek blog reviews
Being more of a drinker (ahem) than a connoisseur I can't claim to give the this wine a fair hearing but within my narrow terms of reference it went down a treat. The one word that does spring to mind is refreshing. What can I say? Give it a try.
The wine is an absolute winner. It has a wonderful crisp taste and went down very well. If only I had some more! It is a perfect wine for parties and would go incredibly well with any sort of sea-food.Yeah, well, corks might be more aesthetically pleasing, but screwtops keeps wine a lot fresher than cork does. Life is suffering etc.The only “downside” I found is that it doesn’t have a cork. Many wine buyers steer clear of wines that are screw top. However, after tasting Stormhoek this weekend, its no longer a problem.
The Stormhoek "Blogger's Wine Freebie" background story is here.
Posted by hugh macleod at July 25, 2005 11:07 AM | TrackBackThe only thing we're going to loose is the ceremonial act of uncorking a bottle at the restaurant table and the chance to pretend to be a real connoisseur.
This seems to be a real problem for restaurant owners, at least for the moment. Only, if you are faced with 10% of the bottles in your cellar being damaged by bad cork you'd be more than willing to switch to screwtops immediately.
There is no factual reason at all that would speak against screwtops. Though I wouldn't agree that screwtops keep the wine "a LOT fresher", they do slow down a bit the maturation process of wine in the bottle; screwtops don't show any disadvantage in terms of storing and long-evity etc. etc. provided that they are processed with the necessary accuracy.
Thorough examinations and analyses for more than a decade in Australia (and other wine-growing countries) have shown that screwtops are at least as good as high-quality cork.
I guess, we'll get used to bottles being "unscrewed", not uncorked in the restaurant.
Yeah, but what about the story of the popping cork?
What is there to replace that with?
(Sorry, I thought I was channeling Seth Godin there for a second... :-) )
My personalised bottle of Stormhoek arrived yesterday. I got bottle 73 of 75 so it may have been a close run thing. I hope to start (and to be frank, finish) drinking it tonight.
Gracias
Posted by: Nick Browne at July 27, 2005 4:37 PMI enjoyed the wine, but couldn't find the Ultimte Freshness Date which sounds like a good idea. Like most people I know very little about wine (apart from that all Rioja is delicious and I drink small vats of its without a problem) and find the supermarket shelves pretty daunting. So having been introduced to Stormhoek and enjoyed it, it's pretty likely I'll at least have a look at it next time I am in Sainsbury's - is it in there?
Posted by: James Cherkoff at July 30, 2005 2:47 PMThe Ultimate Fresheness thingamabob will be on the bottle in Sainsbury's. Y'all got a more bespoke packaging, just for the promotion etc.
Also in Thresher's and Oddbins, but not Tesco's, funnily enough.
The wine you received is very new 2005 stuff, so as long as you drink it within 2 years, you should be fine.
Posted by: hugh macleod at July 30, 2005 4:25 PM