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Have you ever poured a glass of wine and discerned an obvious scent of butter, almost as if someone had just slathered a ration of pure creamery butter on a slice of hot toast? Most often found in Chardonnay but occasionally appearing in other wines, the buttery scent comes from diacetyl, a chemical that produces the characteristic aroma of real butter and that is used as an additive to add a butter scent to margarine.

Some people love this butter flavor. Some find it off-putting. What's your opinion? Just for fun, we've set up this week's Wine Lovers' Voting Booth topic to find out. You're invited to drop by the Voting Booth, to cast your ballot.

It doesn't take most wine enthusiasts long to learn to recognize a wine that's "corked." Once you've had it pointed out, it's easy to detect the musty, mushroomy stench of chlorine-based chemicals from tainted natural corks (or, on occasion, wood and other contaminants).

But White Burgundies, grown in a cool climate, are typically high-acid wines. When a white wine of relatively low acidity - like most California and Australian Chardonnay - is put through "malo," you get the familiar butter flavor. Because this flavor is popular, many wine makers put Chardonnay through "malo" specifically to achieve it. (They may turn up the volume even more by holding the wine in oak barrels, which adds spicy, sweet and vanilla aromas and flavors.)

Bottom line, if the retailer was aware that the wine was damaged, it shouldn't have been on the shelf. And if we hadn't gone ahead and drunk most of the bottle, I would have felt fully justified in taking it back for a refund. If you encounter a wine that's obviously corked or cooked, you should do the same.