I opened a bottle of Vincent Dauvissat's 2001 Chablis recently and I was looking forward to trying it, particularly as I've never had his classic wines. It was ruined! But was it corked, or was it prematurely oxidized? I couldn't tell.
Now, I have problems identifying corked wines from the get-go; it typically takes me anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes to really know if a wine has that wet newspaper / cardboard smell, as opposed to mustiness that might just blow off. But I get there. As for p.mox'ed wines, I would expect it to taste flabby and tired, but I'm not sure I've truly encountered such a beast (as opposed to a wine that's over the hill).
This Chablis should still be drinking very well, but it was flabby, although not particularly dark. On the other hand, there was a damp and rotting smell, but it was the smell of rotting fruit, and not the smell of rotting paper. To add to the intrigue, the cork was a bit stained, although not egregiously so. Should I blame heat damage rather than TCA or p.mox? I'm at a bit of a loss. Or rather, I'm at a lot of a loss, as no matter the cause, I had to pour what should have been a beautiful wine down the drain.
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2 comments:
Sounds like bad heat damage to me. I've had a couple of pre-moxed bottles and the smell/taste is unmistakeable.
And that smell/taste is like... ??? Do tell.
I'm very familiar with the awful newsprint/cardboard smell of the corked wine, but I am not so sure what a p.moxed wine would smell like, except old and maybe vinegary...
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