The following is a clip taken from Austin Beeman's interview on the Upside of 40 Podcast with Sean Mooney.

TOPIC: Wet Ferrets & Carboard Boxes: Detecting Flawed Bottles of Wine in Restaurants.

Sean Mooney: "People have been out to dinner and I guess a lot of it is tradition where they come and they open the bottle of wine and you're the guy who ordered it. So they will come over and make a nice little presentation, and put a little bit in the glass, and you don't know what to do. They swirl it around, they smell, and they're like, "Yeah. Okay." Really, what are you looking for when you do that?"

Austin Beeman: "So here's what's happening..."

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Full Transcript:

Austin Beeman:

You ordered a wine, the waiter went to get it, he came back out and he shows you that. Your job is to make sure that it's the wine you're asking for, the vintage you're asking for, and the specific variation you're asking for. So for example, on certain wines, there'll be a normal version that'll be $100 and reserve that'll be $1,000. If you accept the reserve, you accepted the $1,000 bottle, and that has happened and you've accepted that check. So you want to make sure that it is the thing that you're asking for and they didn't swap a vintage because vintage especially on good quality wine, it matters. It will change dramatically from year to year. So you want to make sure that that wine is what you think it is.

Then it's going to be opened and they're going to show you the cork. Generally, you want to make sure that cork isn't completely falling apart or that it doesn't smell like a wet dog or like a cardboard box. None of those things will automatically mean the wine is flawed, but they are things that might tell you that, "Now I got to pay a lot more attention because there's something-"

Sean Mooney:

Yeah, heads up.

Austin Beeman:

"... possibly wrong here." They're a blinking yellow light as you're driving down the wine road. Then he's going to pour the sample and it should be poured for the person that ordered. That person then is tasting the wine, not to decide whether or not they like it, but to decide whether or not it is flawed in some way. The common flaws will be something known as being corked, which is pretty complicated in terms of the technical side of it. But it means that the wine is damaged by the cork in a way that a percentage of all wines under cork are damaged, and that it will smell off in a way that is cardboardy. And we all know what sort of cardboardy or musty books at grandma's house, or something like that.

If it is flawed in that way, or in a way called being maderized, where it actually smells and tastes like a wet dog, or like feral ferret in the rain, or something like that, then you kick it back and they should bring out a different bottle of that same wine. Because a wine being corked is part of what it means to be a wine. When wine is put under a cork, a percentage of those are going to be flawed. It doesn't matter whether you're talking about a $10 bottle or a $10,000 bottle, a percentage of those wines are going to be flawed. Iin a restaurant environment, part of why you pay a significant markup over what you would pay at a retail store is that they are going to make sure that wine is correct, and they should take it back, no questions asked, boom, and bring out the same bottle.

You should never be like, "Oh, this wine was corked. Get me something else off the list." No, because there's nothing wrong with the wine. There's something wrong with that bottle of the wine. And that's the process that is happening at the dinner table.

Sean Mooney:

Yeah. So the guide even if you're not really knowledgeable, that if it just smells off, just from your own palate, that there's something wrong, there probably is?

Austin Beeman:

Yep. It's those two things: the feral animal or the cardboard box.

Sean Mooney:

Yeah. You've got to mind those.

Austin Beeman:

Those are things that any of us can identify. And if it's subtle and you don't recognize it, then that wine's okay for you and go ahead and drink it and it's not a problem. But if you do recognize it, send it back. Any restaurant worth its salt and almost any restaurant in the world will totally swap it out no problem.