They don’t call it the silly season for nothing

And this one actually lasts for the best part of six months, so I am not referring to Christmas although that’s getting pretty close.

In fact I am referring to the shipping of wine in very hot summer weather. A couple of years ago I remember driving down the Hume Hwy about 90 minutes out of Sydney and passing an open truck that was stacked about 15 boxes high with Mount Mary, Bin 707, John Riddoch, Eileen Hardy, and almost every other recognised exclusive band name you cared to mention. These boxes had no protection from the heat and it was about 36 degrees in the shade. A few hours of baking sun and you have instant mulled wine that is forever stuffed.

On a number of occasions when I have been in the Barossa and McLaren Vale uninsulated trucks have been observed picking up wine from very reputable wineries on days when the temperature was about 40 degrees.

Another factor to be concerned about is the storage in bottle shops. Some shops have little more than “tin sheds” out the back where wine is stored for extended periods. Some shops (which are not even air conditioned) store wine in full sun where the boxes get the baking rays in the late afternoon. Some stores take deliveries in the morning and the cases of wine are off loaded and left in the baking sun for hours. I also fondly remember going “out the back” of one bottle shop to see their best bottles that were not on the shelf. They were lovingly stored behind the cool room with the reverse side of a refrigeration fan blowing hot air onto them.

If you are purchasing c-through or inexpensive reds for immediate consumption the problem of the wine being heat damaged is not critical. Big red wines are pretty forgiving and can take a lot of rough treatment that is less than ideal, however if you are purchasing good quality wine or wine that you wish to cellar, then buying wine that has been heat affected will not make you pleased when you open it a few years down the track.

So what can you do about it? The first thing is to plan. Try to buy as much of your good quality red wines in winter which is not difficult to achieve. Most of the new red releases occur in the cooler months and most non red bigots drink a reasonable percentage of c-through over summer so their red consumption is lower anyway.

If you are going to buy good quality wines during the hot summer months insist that the supplier does not ship the wine until the temperature is going to be a bit cooler for a few days. Most reputable suppliers won’t mind. If you are going on winery visits and don’t intend drinking the wine in the short term, ask the winery to hold the wine and ship it in the cooler months. On a number of occasions I have had wine held for three or four months waiting for things to cool down.

It’s also critical to only purchase your wines from reputable stores where you know the wine has been properly looked after before you get it. So avoid places that look they don’t know how to store wine because if they look like they don’t know what they are doing then the chances of getting heat damaged wine is much higher.

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This week’s link Sommnet  is a New Zealand site with daily wine news, some interesting articles and over 10,000 wine reviews. Happy reading and drinking.

Cheers

Ric