Wine Cork vs. High Quality Screw Cap: A Definitive Answer

Do wine bottle closures matter to you? Do you think that screw-capped bottles contain cheaper or lower quality wines? Are you a die-hard cork devotee?

I think I have a definitive answer to the cork vs. high end screw cap closure question.

At an André Lurton Wines tasting, we had two Sauvignon Blanc bottles from the same Château, same vintage, bottled at the same time and having the same amount of cellar time in the same cellar. They differed only in the fact that one was using a high-end screw cap closure (Stelvin™) and the other a cork closure.

At its simplest, the closure on a wine bottle must keep the liquid in the bottle inside and must keep oxygen out. But there are many different closure advantages to consider depending on how you like the wines you drink.

Tradition, cost, style of winemaking, and consumer acceptability all influence the closure selected by a wine producer.

The biggest problem that cork has to overcome is its susceptibility to TCA (2,4,6-trichloroanisole), a cork contaminant that gives a musty odor and taste to the wine, making it smell and taste like soggy, wet cardboard!

In the Lurton tasting, the differences were rather subtle, but very evident. The Stelvin-closed wine felt young, fresh, fruity, and quite aromatic.

It was a wine that begged to be consumed, accompanying gravlax salmon or perhaps a trout meuniere, a nice runny French cheese, or even some melon with prosciutto wrapped around it. By preventing micro-oxidation to occur while the wine was cellared, the metal closure kept the fruity aromas inside the bottle.

On the other hand, the cork-closed wine was a little less aromatic but much more complex. This wine called for a skilled cook that could match the wine’s complexity to much more sophisticated fare. Perhaps grilled scallops topped with caviar, a shrimp fried in garlic oil main course, or even a tree-ripened peach over a slab of sharp Irish cheddar.

Both wines were very good. The Stelvin closure had kept one bottle feeling much younger than the cork-closed one that had allowed micro-oxidation to occur, allowing the wine to become much more complex than its Stelvin-closed sibling.

So it all boils down to your taste. If you like young, fresh, aromatic wines, a Stelvin-closed bottle would be fine for you. On the other hand, if you like complex, sophisticated wines, the cork closure would be better for you. The same goes for a number of red wine bottles from other producers that we have tried.

Both types of closure can have their place in the scheme of things. It should be up to you to select which bottle to purchase with what type of closure. À santé!