I'm writing in response to article from Gilbert Labour regarding Stelvins, tainted wine & judges’ preferences.

The article quoted that at the 2002 National Riesling Challenge, 154 wines were entered, of which 74% (or 114 wines) used Stelvin closures. Therefore 40 wines used some sort of cork.
Also, 2% (or 3 wines) were rejected due to a perceived fault, but no wines from stelvin bottles were rejects. Therefore, 3 of 40 (or 7.5%) wines using corks were rejected. This is approximately normal, considering the figures quoted elsewhere on torbwine.com.

Then the writer quotes:
"Are the judges' palates already so highly tuned and conditioned to the pristine, razor sharp definition of young Stelvin capped white wines, that they perceive any trait other than the above, as faults? Are they misreading early development & character and different "styles" of wine making as aberrant and undesirable traits? .... Are we heading towards homogeneity of palate in our delicate whites, especially Rieslings?"

I don't think that we are heading towards homogeneity of palate, but we are certainly heading towards a zero tolerance of wines which have been adversely affected by their closures. I can't believe that there are no stylistic differences between 114 Stelvin-capped Rieslings, since the winemakers have every opportunity to make a wine to a distinctive style, but the judges did not pick any of these as faulty.

It is also interesting to note that for each of the 3 "faulty" wines, the judges were able to open another bottle or 2 and find a satisfactory wine. This shows that there is bottle variation in these wines, even at such an early stage of development. Is this a desirable trait in a wine? Personally, I don't think so. If I buy a case of a wine, I don't want a few great bottles, some good ones, and some rotten ones.

I think that the trend towards Stelvin-capped wines should be applauded. Yes, it will change the taste of some of our wines, but those changes will mostly be improvements. We will be able to be more confident that those wines in our cellar are not corked, and the days of bringing a backup bottle to a restaurant may be over.

Frank Hayward