Tonight I opened up a D’Arenberg Cadenzia GSM 2004 which was sealed with a ‘Zork’ plastic closure. For those not familiar with a Zork, it is a plastic cork that still has the romantic ‘pop’ of cork and is resealable. A contingent of Mclaren Vale winemakers banded together a few years ago to make a range of Grenache based wines with the ‘Cadenzia’ badge, all sealed with the Zork – following in the footsteps perhaps of the Clare Valley winemakers in 2000, whom all followed each other and released a contingent of Rieslings in screwcap.

Somehow I don’t think the Zork initiative was as succesful, as the poor Zork seems to have been relegated to Cordial bottles. But tonight this exercise was more about investigating the potential of Zork’s impacts on a wines ageability – Gosh I hope this is not a representative example, or the Zork may be destined to remain on the cordial bottle. The Zork itself opens up with the normal pop, but its coated in sludge and the pop is less than convincing. Dark red in colour, the nose opens up quite mushroomy, metallic and dare I say it, unsavourably bretty. The palate is better, but the front palate is dirty and again quite metallic, the finish is much more classic D’Arenberg polished tannins.

So in the end, I’d hazard a guess that we have either three outcomes – either the bottle was cooked, the Zork didn’t quite seal right, or the wine underneath it is totally shot. Without a reference point, I’m drawing no conclusions….