KEY POINTS:
It was a Moldovan sauvignon blanc that smelled of rodent droppings and old socks and tasted of battery acid with notes of male urinal that will go down as the most rank wine that's ever passed my lips, albeit momentarily.
Made in a winery strewn with dead birds
decaying in the midst of the most archaic equipment I'd ever clapped eyes on, you can breathe a sigh of relief that a wine like this is an exception to the rule, with most nowadays as clean and fault free as the freshly scrubbed steel vats in which many are made.
Despite this, there is still the odd rogue fault that can slip through even the most stringent quality control.
Some are particularly detrimental to a wine's enjoyment, while others are even appreciated by some as a positive attribute.
One of the most common faults encountered in the past was cork taint - a dank, mouldy smell and off taste imparted from a compound called Trichloranisole (TCA) found in cork bark. Its effects range from turning a wine into a musty mess that most would reject, to lower levels that more insidiously dull fruit flavours.
With the rise of the screwcap, which now tops an estimated 90-95 per cent of our domestic wine production, this has become less of an issue, while wineries opting for cork are increasingly choosing Diam technical closure made from cork particles treated by a process that appears to eradicate TCA.
A bigger stink has recently been kicked up over hydrogen sulphide, a reductive taint which produces eggy and rubbery odours that in small quantities can blow off with a few swirls of the glass, but at worst leave lingering odours of garlic and sewage.
It's become a hot topic due to the fact that the tight seal provided by screwcaps can encourage this to develop, although this seems to have been largely remedied through attention to winemaking techniques.
At the opposite end of the spectrum is oxidation, where excessive oxygen has been absorbed by a wine via a defective closure or through poor storage. This makes a wine increasingly lose its fruit and freshness, with sherry-like aromas developing in whites and caramelly odours in red.
Another malodorous mischief maker is volatility.
This can be caused by acetic acid, which produces a vinegary smell and sour taste or ethyl acetate that's reminiscent of nail polish.
Sulphur dioxide, employed in almost all wines to protect them from oxidation, can also cross the line into the unacceptable in excess.
Then it can be smelled as a struck match-like odour and sometimes sensed as a prickling sensation in the nose and throat, to which people have varying degrees of sensitivity.
There are also a number of harmless suspects that are often mistaken for faults.
A bit of cork floating in your wine doesn't mean it's corked, more likely that you've made a dog's breakfast of opening the bottle.
Older red wines are often cloudy due to the sediment that falls out with time, which just needs to settle to the bottom of the bottle before decanting.
And if you find crystals in your wine, don't panic that they're glass as it's likely these are tartrates formed by the crystallisation of a substance found naturally in grapes.
Finally, there's brettanomyces, the most controversial fault of them all.
The barnyard-like character kicked up by this yeast is regarded in some quarters as adding complexity, while in others - especially in the New World - it's considered a nasty spoilage bug to be avoided at all costs.
I'm in the middle on this one. I don't mind whiff of brett, but if a wine smells rancid or reeks of dirty stable, then that's too much for me.
Fault finding is certainly not clean cut: thank goodness they're a relative rarity.
A FAULTLESS THREE
ITALIAN TAKE ON SAUVIGNON
Mount Nelson Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc 2007
$20-25
A sauvignon from the Marlborough vineyards of Tuscan heavyweight Antinori, which juxtaposes ripe fleshy melon fruit and soft herbal nuances with steely mineral notes that linger on its fabulous finish.
From Glengarry, Bacchus.
HOT MEDITERRANEAN
Chateau de Lascaux Coteaux du Languedoc 2005
$21.00
This ripe and rounded blend of syrah and grenache from Southern France is smooth, savoury and full of dark berries seasoned with a pinch of Mediterranean herbs. Rare for France, it's also under screwcap, which means no musty surprises.
From Point Wines, Wine Vault, Maison Vauron.
PROMISING PINOT
Camshorn Dommett Clays Waipara Pinot Noir 2006
$32.95
The most impressive vintage of pinot so far from Pernod Ricard's Waipara estate, with structure, spice and robust ripe dark fruit.
From Fine Wine Delivery Company, First Glass and fine wine stores.
