Corked

It’s a gas. Not exactly but close to eighty nine point seven percent of the cork is compressed from the same gas that makes air. This is one of the many reasons that makes wine the aesthetical treat to enjoy with just about any cuisine. Historically the name cork was given to the bark of the cork oak tree grown throughout Western Mediterranean Basin plantations known to the Spanish as, “Montados.” Generally the oak trees won’t be ripe until they have reached a there third harvest. Due to deforestation only one percent of the trees in this region will be used. Thanks to the abundance of the oak cork tree in this region that one percent produces seventy percent of the worlds manufactured cork. By the time the third harvest comes around for the cork oak tree it would have reached its fortieth birthday. Averaging out the cork oak tree’s life span, it’s been known to reach ages of one hundred and seventy five too two hundred years of age. That’s a long life of nurture and growth. All for what? So we can enjoy a bottle of wine for one, maybe two hours at most? For what we find to be complete and utter bliss, but then it hits you once you fined that special bottle of chateau , sharing it with the one’s you love that completely catches you into the wines true beauty and the process that it goes through to be what it’s become today. The cork was originated in the year three thousand B.C. where it was used as a fishing apparatus. Through the ages it became a tool used by the Egyptians, Babylonians, Assyrians, Phoenicians, and the Persians. It wasn’t until the eighteenth century that the exploitation of the cork hit industrial popularity for the usage of the glass container to store wine. From beginning to end the cork has maintained its power and prestige to become something enriched with life and to be a part of something as passionate as a bottle