Sure, the sound of a cork popping from a bottle is part of the fun (and hassle) of drinking wine. But it’s not a necessary part. Peter Granoff, an owner of Ferry Plaza Wine Merchants & Wine Bar in San Francisco, and Andrea Robinson, author of Great Wine Made Simple (Broadway Books, $28, www.amazon.com) and the dean of wine studies at the French Culinary Institute, offer their opinions on other ways to store and serve their favorite beverage.

What’s wrong with cork?

As a naturally occurring material, cork has its pros and cons. “It creates a great environment for wine to age in a cellar,” says Robinson. “It’s slightly porous so it allows a very, very slow interaction with the environment — and that’s ultimately what creates great wines.” However, she adds, cork can break down or degrade, which can make it difficult to get out of the bottle. And there are environmental issues, too. Harvested from the bark of the cork oak — which, happily, does not have to be felled in the process — cork is a renewable resource. But “the strain on the supply has grown,” Robinson says, “because the amount of cork-finished wine from all over the world has increased. Australia used to be a blip on the radar screen and now it’s huge. Chile, Argentina, and South Africa are all now making fine wine — and that, along with increased production in our camp, puts a major strain on the cork supply.”

Another con is that natural material is susceptible to natural contamination. “There is a quality problem with cork that stems from a compound called TCA, or trichloranisole, which is a naturally occurring mold that lives in cork bark,” says Granoff, who finds the problem in about ten percent of the bottles he opens (Robinson finds it in six to eight percent). “The end result is that when you have TCA in cork, the wine takes on a musty, damp-cardboard, old-closet kind of smell that can strip the wine of any fruit character.” This phenomenon, known as “cork taint,” isn’t harmful, but it essentially ruins the wine — and there’s no way to tell if your bottle is “corked” until you open it. (Robinson suggests that if you find your bottle is tainted, seal it back up and return it to the retailer for a replacement.)