The turn of the corkscrew

Consider the corkscrew. If you’ve opened a large number of wine bottles over the years, you may have thought about this subject once or twice. You probably have your own favorites.

Not all corkscrews are created alike, however. There have been variations in the design, durability and aesthetic quality of the corkscrew ever since the simple device entered our lives a few hundred years ago. (Who knows what people used in those barbaric days before the corkscrew? One’s teeth, perhaps.)

Anyone who’s ordered a bottle of wine in a restaurant in the Philippines, particularly in the provinces, knows that Filipino waiters are masters at opening bottles with a simple knife blade; not even a trace of cork floats in your glass.

Most of us are not so lucky.

Probably the worst-designed corkscrews are the simple metal-and-wooden handle numbers. They’re hard to position on the cork, they rarely screw in straight, and they require about 1,500 pounds of force to pop. They’ve served mankind for a long time, but somebody, at some point, must have said: enough is enough. We deserve better.

So there have been wonderful refinements in corkscrew technology over the years. A great number of fancy models have passed through my hands, some made of steel, others of plastic. Material doesn’t seem to matter so much as design. I won’t say I collect corkscrews, in the devoted way that some people collect fountain pens or Hummel figurines. Indeed, if a corkscrew repeatedly fails, it typically ends up banished to a kitchen drawer somewhere. Bring on the next corkscrew.

(Speaking of design, why is it that so many household objects are now being made with thick, odd-blobby handles? I’m specifically thinking of plastic toothbrushes, which no longer come just in regular, squared-off, grippable shapes, but seem to be striving for Philippe Starck whimsy. Really, it’s a bitch to grab an Oral B with a thick, formless handle, and it’s even tougher to stick the bottom end in your average toothbrush holder.

Flatware, too, is now adopting odd handle shapes – the worst being smooth and tubular, which is nearly impossible to grip when cutting meat. It’s a clear case of form f***ing with function.)

Anyway, back to corkscrews. The "pin" type corkscrew looks like an advance over the classic corkscrew mentioned above: faintly resembling a doctor’s hypodermic needle, it has two easily graspable handles that are used to raise the cork after you’ve plunged the spiral. It sure looks cool, with the steel gears in view and its bottle-opener handle; but this design often results in a broken cork, to my experience. It’s not nearly as functional as its elegant design would have us believe.

I was happy with the age-old waiter’s corkscrew for some time. This one has a pocketknife-type design, with the added advantage of a bottle opener thrown in for good measure. To see a waiter or sommelier actually pop this number over a wine bottle top, work in the spiral, lever the holder under the lip, and slowly slide the cork out is poetry in motion. It’s handy, and it’s pretty reliable. But many bottles nowadays lack a pronounced lip around the bottle top, making it harder for the waiter’s corkscrew to get any traction. So, for me, it was back to the drawing board.

After much, much research into the matter, I’ve come to believe the best design for the corkscrew is the "Screwpull" model designed by Houston space engineer Herbert Allen back in 1975. (It’s even listed in the Guinness Book of World Records for opening the greatest number of bottles in one minute.) What makes it better is a circular frame that fits over the bottle and helps center the spiral; on top is a knob that you can turn continuously; the action forces the spiral upward, smoothly drawing out the cork as you turn. No popping required. Even better: most models come with a self-enclosed "catcher" that grips the cork once it comes out of the bottle. Thus, instead of destroying the cork or risking injury while trying to remove it from the spiral, you just rotate it gently until it’s free. It’s really one of life’s little marvels.

Variations on the Screwpull are plentiful, such as a red version made by Seiger that makes the experience even more effortless. There’s a Screwpull Lever version that doesn’t require twisting a knob – just position the spiral base over the bottle and lift up the lever. The French also have an intricate, layered variation of the Screwpull called the Zig-Zag, but I have not field-tested this one.

My most recent acquisition is a Cooks Collection Screwpull made of simple plastic – it was sent by a local restaurant which we had featured in The STAR – and is available, I believe, at Brumms Wines, Rustan’s Makati and Santi’s Delis. If they have built a better, simpler, hassle-free corkscrew than this, I’ve yet to see it. All of these corkscrews, by the way, range in price from $6 to $25.

Of course, I’ll still keep my waiter’s cork-screw. It’s probably the least osten-tatious opener you can carry along on, say, a camping trip. But I don’t think I’ll be bringing it with me on any inter-national flights for the time being. It’s a bit threatening-looking.