Dimples

So this lady asked me why our wine corks have “dimples” and it took me a minute to understand what she was saying. When you get ready to open a bottle of our wine and remove the capsule top, you can see a small dimple in the top of our synthetic corks.

The dimple is where the corker pushes the cork down into the bottle. Keep in m ind we do everything by hand here, so if you have a bottle of our wine, its about a 95% chance I put the cork in it.

The corker squeezes the cork and then I pull a piston down the rams the cork into the bottle before it can fully expand again, sealing the bottle. I have been very, very pleased with the synthetic corks, they seem to seal better; they allow customers to store wine upright if they so choose, they seem easy to withdraw (no customer complaints); and they cost no more than regular low-end corks. The best part is we do not get the chipping when we put the cork in or when you take it out that we did with real corks.

I said I put in about 95% of the corks, I do occasionally have kind friends who offer to help out and a few crazy customers who want to assist. Due to cleanliness rules, we cannot let just anybody in the winery to help, you have to get cleaned up, a bit sanitized if you will, to help. Since I am doing the corking in the evenings, I do not get a lot of volunteers and since we do small batches I can handle a few hours corking fairly well. Maybe as I get older I will try a Tom Sawyer routine and tell everyone how much fun corking and bottling is, and everyone should drive a few thousand corks into a bottle for exercise!

For our 44 Winery Bus Tour participants, I’ll inject a little news: we have confirmed the Hampton Inn as our overnight stay and it has a pool, hot tub, and exercise room. We are still working on the Saturday dinner menu, but it looks like we will be wine tasting and eating at the new River City Winery in New Albany, your menu choices will come by email soon. Best Vineyards has signed on for a Sunday tasting slot, specializing in their semi-sweet estate wines. To get us home at a decent hour Sunday, we will have a buffet at a Ryans Steakhouse in the Indianapolis area, it’s the fastest way to feed 50 people!

Keep in mind our HOOSIER CHEESE DAYS celebration of Indiana-made cheese begins August 14 and lasts as long as ten pounds of cheese lasts…