After a lot of shipping season worry stories, I started to feel that we as a crowd are kind of weak-kneed about how sturdy our wines are. I noticed a lot of posts about fears about what might happen (something awful) along side some more soothing tales about what usually does happen (nothing). In fact, I recall that one berserker (can’t remember who) was doing a test by letting a bottle roll around in his trunk for a while, to taste test it next to one that was in his cellar.
So here’s another data point, or something:
I was feeling blasé about it when I put three mixed cases of wine into my garage a month ago – I have an offsite, but I didn’t get there that quickly. It was in the 70s, the nights were in the 50s, the roof is white, and the thermometer I have in the garage never went much above 73. Then, one day, it was 79. I can’t swear it was just 79 that day, and to be fair, it’s possible that the temperature got that high 3-4 days before I removed the wines and properly stored them. But if it was 79, it wasn’t that high continuously, just for a few hours of the day.
And the wines, by and large, are ruined.
Nothing in there is that delicate (I think). I drink mostly California cabs, Bordeaux and French regional wines. There wasn’t any (say) Burgundy there.
I don’t have a handle on the extent of the damage yet, but I’ve been tasting through, and some really nice stuff is very dead. A 2010 Tempier Bandol, a couple 04 Pontet Canets, a Jean Edwards Stagecoach, a Les Rouliers, all shot. The symptoms are either that the wine is like port, it has an ashy aftertaste, or it’s just weird and astringent, followed by port and ash.
On the other hand, a Gravette de Certan was great, and so was a Di Costanzo, and a different Jean Edwards. Seemingly unaffected. I can’t figure out if there’s a varietal that’s more sturdy or if it’s just luck of the draw.
This is the second time I’ve had wines actually go south because of heat – last year, when it hit 106 in San Francisco, the sun shone directly on a couple of bottles of Ridge and those just went belly up instantly. But this new situation was weird to me – I genuinely thought upper 70s wasn’t a deal breaker.
G