Bordeaux Wine Enthusiasts

This is a first for me...

The wine shipment was scheduled to deliver by Friday and the tracking all along said so till yesterday. However, now it is slated to deliver on Monday. Now it is sitting on a trailer and the temperature is around 90. They will not unload it onto delivery truck until late sunday or early monday.

Now the question is shall I refuse the package? Does anyone have experience regarding the wine getting cooked under similar conditions? What's your opinion?

Is the temperature over 90 the whole day for just a few hours late afternoon?

The wine may be pretty cool to begin with and moving it up in temp to cook it takes a little while.

Right where I am our temps range from 50 to 85F.

Give a ring to your vendor. They might suggest accepting it, and tasting one to see if it is cooked, and then do a return.

But its hard to say without knowing your local temps.

It could be in a warehouse over the weekend, offloaded from the long-haul trailer and waiting to be loaded onto the delivery truck. You could try calling the carrier to see if they can tell you anything. I like Arv's advice to call the vendor.

The trouble with heat damage is that it might not be severe enough to cause obvious seepage or a cooked character on arrival, but it could still adversely affect long-term aging. Red wine isn't too delicate though, and a couple of hours in the high 70s or low 80s probably won't damage it. As Arv says, the wine may stay cooler than the daily high temp.

I'd be less worried about this situation at the cusp of Fall, than I would be if the same situation had happened 3-4 months earlier.

If these are daily quaffers it may not make a big difference anyways. Something being laid down for decades is a different situation.