Have you ever gotten a corked bottle replaced by your retailer?
(Para español, usa el traductor en el lado derecho. No tuve tiempo para hacerlo yo mismo. Lo siento)
About 2 months ago, I opened a bottle of 2017 Emiliana Coyam Los Robles Estate Colchagua. It’s a highly rated blend of 43% Syrah, 29% Carmenere, 12 % Cabernet Sauvignon, 5% Mourvedre, 3% Petit Verdot, 3% Carignan, 2% Malbec, 2% Garnacha, 1% Tempranillo; The winery is biodynamic, organic and carbon neutral. With 13,078 cases made, you can find it in several Chilean supermarkets as a top shelf wine costing around $25, but outside of Chile I’ve seen it for $23- $40.
However, this wine was corked (read our previous posts about corks and sniffing corks). It actually took me a while to conclude this because honestly I haven’t had that many corked wines in my life. Secondly, not all corked wines have strong typical notes of wet dog, wet cardboard, and mold. These notes did come later, but what struck me about this wine at first was the lack of fruit. It’s known as a rather bold fruit driven wine, but all I could taste was oak and acid with barely any fruit, so I gave it a lot of time hoping that it would open up. It never improved and the more typical notes of wet paper started to emerge. Therefore, I learned a lesson about corked wines: they can also mute flavors of the wine. Cork taint like other aromas/tastes of wine can be subtle, vary in levels of contamination and vary based on the wine itself and the taster’s genetics/tolerance, and/or it can simply just mute the flavors of a wine.
Now that I was sure it was corked, I tried something I’ve never tried. I contacted the retailer to see if I could get a new bottle. I’ve had flawed bottles before such as oxidized and corked bottles, but they were never expensive enough to bother trying to get another bottle or I had bought them so long ago that I felt it was just too late and I didn’t have the receipt. However, in this case, I had records of this rather recent purchase since I had bought this online, so I decided to give it a try.
The best way to return a wine is actually to bring the undrunk bottle to the dealer with your receipt. The dealer should be paid back by the wine producer in theory. However, most shops are still physically closed due to the pandemic so all I could do was email them with my order number. After several emails and follow ups, I eventually did get a bottle back almost 2 months later. I checked other dealers in Chile to see their policy, and not all of them allow this, but it’s worth checking. You get to drink the wine that you wanted to drink without paying extra. Below are my tasting notes.
Tasting Notes
The store actually gave me the 2018 vintage of this wine rather than the 2017. 2018 is supposed to be a great vintage in Chile despite Chile generally being quite homogenous in quality year to year. 42% Syrah, 39% Carmenere, 6% Cabernet Sauvignon, 5% Grenache, 3% Malbec, 3% Carignan, 1% Tempranillo, 1% Mourvedre. The nose is complex featuring ripe dark berry fruit, a touch of earthiness, some savory herbs and tomato leaf, coffee and vanilla. On the palate there’s ripe berry fruit, medium acidity giving it just enough freshness, with a savory streak and silky texture. No heat like I’ve experienced in previous vintages. It’s a good representation of Colchagua’s 2 best grapes: Carmenere and Syrah. Although this remains on the modern side, it’s the most elegant and pure version of Coyam I’ve had. In the past, I’ve found the oak and alcohol to be a bit too much. Maybe the increase in quality is due to the great vintage as well. This should have a lot of fans. 93 pts AC.
Conclusion
If you ever have the unfortunate experience of a corked bottle, don’t forget that you might be able to return the bottle for a replacement one. Give it a try next time it happens to you.
