Following the suggestion of GregP that I simulate travel shock by using a blender, we did the following experiment last night.
Tues night late, I took 2 btls of EdmundsStJohn LosRoblesViejo RozetVnyd PasoRobles WhiteWine (13.9%; Roussanne/Viognier/Marsanne) 2001: $10.50. I opened both and gently poured both btls into a large pitcher. I then immediately refilled one btl gently from the pitcher and recorked. The remaining wine I poured into my blender. I then hit the "high speed" button and blended it for 3.5 minutes. It frothed up to the top of the blender, but pretty rapidly subsided when I hit the off button. This "blended" wine was then gently poured back into the 2'nd btl and recorked. Both btls were then sent to the fridge to rest for the following night's tasting.
They were then served to my group as Wine A & B. They were identified as the EdStJ wine and one in the same wine as of two days ago (assuming no btl variation once again). They were asked to identify the differences, if any, between the two samples.
To my palate the differences were striking. Sample B had almost no nose, sample A had the same fragrant/floral/perfumed nose that this wine has always shown. On the palate, the differences were less obvious. Sample B just seemed to be somewhat flat and dead and didn't have nearly the fruit and brightness that Sample A showed. A poll of the tasters was unanimous in that assessment. There was, of course, no signs of oxidation in either sample.
The label was then uncovered. Sample B was the "blender" wine, pretty much as I expected. I then explained to my tasters what the experiment was.
This experiment can be faulted on all sorts of grounds:
1. This pouring of both btls into the pitcher may not have sufficiently blended the ttwo btls and the result can still be attributed to btl variation.
2. My blender was a Cuisinart and not a Kitchen Aid, Waring, or Cray.
3. A statistical analysis of the voting was not undertaken.
4. The glasses used amongst the tasters was not uniform in shape and size.
5. There was not a silence enforced amongst the tasters and the "mob rule" effect may have transpired, leading them to all agree Sample B was flawed.
6. Since I poured them two samples, they were already biased to expect a difference in the two wines.
7. The EdStJ wine I used was too delicate to withstand the blender treatment; a more robust wine would not have shown any differences.
8. I blended for 3.5 minutes; it should have been for only 2.38 minutes.
9., 10., 11.....ad naseaum.
So...what does this experiment show?? Well....it certainly shows that 3.5 minutes in a blender can pretty much beat up the nose and palate of a wine. Maybe nothing more than that.
I don't think it has much, if anything, to do with traveling shock on a wine. During traveling, a wine no way is subjected to that much oxygen exposure.
It is, however, a (probably extreme) demonstration of bottle shock. It is universally accepted that when a wine is put into the bottle, no matter how gently the process is done, it goes into bottle shock, seems dumber and not as alive as it was, pre-bottling. Amerine attributes this btl shock effect to the uptake of oxygen during the bottling. And his conclusion is based on much cruder bottling technology prevalent back in the '40's-'50's.
Anyway...that's my experiment and I'm sticking to it. Don't put your wine in a blender.
TomHill