Consider the corkscrew. There’s perhaps no device in the world that greater exemplifies the moment of need, the sort of thing you all but forget about until the exact moment it’s called for. Armed with a trusty screw, the world is your vinous oyster, but go lacking a cork puller at the critical juncture, and you’ll find yourself well and truly screwed.
Few things in life run a wider gamut of taste and expense than wine, which is simultaneously an everyday drink for the masses and a rich man’s plaything, the sort of hobby in which one might spend $20 or $20,000 on a 750 ml bottle. So, too, goes the corkscrew, which ranges in price and functionality from the humblest plastic pocket tool to the grandest of titanium alloy sommelier status symbol. There are electric corkscrews the size of a personal massager, grand winged corkscrews that look more like something you’d encounter at the dentist, no-name imports that do a surprisingly good job, and name-brand favorites that shockingly disappoint. Every bottle of wine gets you buzzed, but no two bottles of wine are the same, even from the same producer in the very same year; in the same breath every corkscrew opens a bottle of wine, but no two corkscrews are precisely alike, even if they utilize the same general style and approach. The two entities are forever twinned, like that couple you know who seem to be undeniably made for each other—the cork needs the screw, and vice versa. I find something poetic about it all.
Check out our other drink-related guides, like Best Barware and Best Nonalcoholic Wines.
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What Kind of Corkscrew Should You Buy?
This honestly depends a great deal on the sort of wine you like to drink. For casual wine drinkers, it makes sense to spend as little as possible while seeking a baseline level of functionality. The most basic and traditional style of corkscrew is known as a “waiter’s style” and has been used for the past hundred years or more by hospitality workers worldwide. These corkscrews all have the same basic parts: a hinge at the top; a worm, or spiral, which drills into the cork; and a blade that allows you to cut the foil from the top of the bottle. Open one bottle using this style of screw and you’ll be able to open a thousand.
From there, things get more esoteric. Winged corkscrews use a base-and-lever approach, but they’re considerably larger than the waiter’s style and better suited for home use. A broad range of electric corkscrews harness technology to do the cork-pulling work for you, typically requiring a battery and sometimes even a bulky countertop charging station. Less known is the infinity corkscrew, which uses a simple turn of the wrist to remove a cork. There are also highly specialized corkscrews like the Durand, which is a revelation in the tricky art of removing vintage wine corks, as well as designer and conceptual corkscrews in the hundreds, or even thousands of dollars.
