Now That’s A Corker

We have a large demijohn (damigiana) bottle made for bulk wine that sits in our dining room. It’s size is that of about 100 liters. I bought it as a lark while visiting the town of Malcesine on Italy’s Lake Garda. Years ago in our home in Italy, I started filling it with corks from various bottles of wine that graced our table. When we moved back to the United States in 2010, the giant bottle came with us. It’s been like a family member for years. However, it has reached retirement age. This year was its last in terms of housing my used corks as it is now completely full. How many corks are in there? At full capacity, there are 2,250 corks from all varieties of wine.

People who come to dinner at our house often stare at this giant bottle and then at the corks inside. Their query is always the same: “You didn’t really drink that many bottles, did you?” Our answer, in unison, is always a simple yes, although we admit we had a little help from dinner guests along the way. (You know who you are!)

It’s really not that big of feat. We have been collecting corks since 2006. That’s 11 years or 4,015 days. If you divide 2,250 corks by 4,015 days you come up with roughly one half a cork per day. It means that we drink a half a bottle of wine a day. That’s not a lot, especially if you factor in the fact that our last name ends with a vowel and we have more than a few wine drinking friends.

We are now looking for another large vessel to store our future corks. The Hindenburg would have worked well. However, our original full bottle will stand in our dining room for years to come. Although we will continue to collect our corks, our original demijohn will always be a corker.

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