I’m not planing on revisiting the screw top vs cork closure debate. Honestly it doesn’t bother me either way. On one hand, I kinda like pulling out my ridiculously expensive rosewood Laguiole and seductively easing a cork out of the bottle. On the other hand, cork taint does indeed suck, and my palate is super sensitive to any amount of oxidation flavors. So, catch me on any given day and I may lean in one direction or the other, or neither. Today I’m firmly a Neither!
But here’s a little dilemma and my thoughts on how to deal with it.
Lets be honest, not everyone thinks about wine the way we do. You can’t really know for sure what someone’s opinion- is on new world vs old, single vineyard vs AVA or whatnot unless you’ve asked. And honestly there are a lot of people that really enjoy wine, are self-professed wine lovers and yet don’t have much of a clue about any of the former. No biggie.
But, again, moment of honesty time, everyone does a little snap judgement on Christmas gifts they receive. You do it. You know you do. I do it. No shame.
So, what if you really want to share a specific bottle from your private stash…maybe a rare bird….. and as you pull it and begin to prepare it for bagging and pretty-papering you realize …..ITS A SCREW TOP.
I mean…..kinda a messy moment, right? I guess if that scene is play out on the Sonoma Coast, you kinda don’t really care much. Everybody gets it. Atlanta? Coin flip.
So, real talk here, this past week I decided to pull a nice bottle from my cellar & gift it to an important work colleague. (read: has the ability to fire me). Grabbed a really nice pinot from one of my fav winemakers. Wrapped it, bagged it, and did the fluffy decorative paper fountain thingy on top. Cheers!
Wait….its s a screw top! Will he know? Damn. I mean, I don’t want to be a snot, but I also wanted to get some gifting credit for pulling a bottle that I’d otherwise really like to keep for myself.
Here’s where I landed. Good wine is good wine. Where the rubber meets the road is when lip touches glass & then touches wine. I figured it would be obvious when opened. The bottle stayed in the wrapped bag, fluffy paper and all. The extra touch – just to cover all the bases, I added a personal note that said “Here’s one of my very favorite bottles for special occasions. I’m sure you’ll enjoy. Tell me what you think after you try it.”
Subtle image-making, but I believe just a few words helped to frame the intent as much as the gift.
Try it if you have an embarrassingly pretentious moment like I did. Worked for me.
