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After asking around, some people would not be surprised if, with cork, three were good, six were ok but well short of the good ones and three were poor.

One wine lover who heard about our question got in touch to say he had bought 60 bottles of a 2012 Bordeaux Superior this year with 8 years under ProCork and with ProCork, he would expect all twelve bottles in a case will be good because he had only opened good bottles so far.

The main offender is Cork Tannin. The variation in Cork Tannin between corks is amazingly high and new research is indicating Cork Tannin may destroy the wine flavour as insidiously as TCA.

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In one study, Cork Tannins extracted into wine in 10 days from corks of the best quality, ranged tenfold from 53,000 to 742,000 parts per billion*. At 200 parts per billion the astringency of Cork Tannin is noticeable, that’s a few drops in an Olympic sized swimming pool.

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Some wine critics are starting to observe that Cork Tannin appears to block the ability to taste the full flavour of the wine. Jean-Marc Quarin, independent wine critic, published a comparison tasting in his Chronicles on 21 October, 2020 where he identified the presence of bitter and tannic effects which “blocked the progress of the stimulation in the mouth and damaged the finish”. Cork Tannin was later shown to be responsible.

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