About 3 weeks ago, while working on a slow Thursday afternoon, I received a call from a local resident who asked if I was willing to help him asses the quality and possible value of some bottles that he had recently found in the basement of the house he had just inherited from his father. I end up doing this a few times every year, it seems, and it generally results in showing the owner how he/she can type the name of the wine into Google and discover that the bottle of White Star/Beringer/Mondavi/etc. is worth exactly what it is worth everyday.

 Then he walked in.

Carrying a dusty cardboard box filled with very dusty, oddly shaped bottles. The bottles were labeled as Moet Champagne 1922, and had clearly been reused. Back then, many bottles were hand blown, and these certainly had been. Immediatly I was disappointed when I saw that the corks were loose, port corks. Bad sign. We poured 2 glasses and it instantly smelled and looked like old Sherry. Obviously fortified (high alcohol), but still a nice nuttiness. I braved it and while it was completely vinegarized, it wasn't bad. At some point, his father had made a very passable, basement Sherry, that had survived for as many as 40 years without tight corks or good conditions. It was one of the most interesting days I have had since I started in this business.