The Basics: How To Store Wine

27 04 2011

I’ve mentioned previously that around 95% of all wine on the market is meant to be popped and poured (blog product placement totally intentional) within 6 months of purchase.  For these wines, unless you keep them in the trunk of your car or directly over top of your stove, storage conditions probably won’t be a huge concern.  However, for wines that are intended to be aged, or for any wine that you want to try and keep in optimal condition, storage techniques become much more important.  Proper storage helps ensure that your $20 (or $50, or $200) bottle of wine will give you your money’s worth and show itself as well as possible when you do pull the cork; best of all, you don’t need a high-tech humidity-controlled cellar to keep your wines in good shape.  If you follow these basic storage rules, you will be ahead of the wine-aging game: Read the rest of this entry »


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Tips & Tricks: Don’t Drink Your Reds Too Warm!

27 03 2011

This fridge wants to see your reds for a few minutes.

One of the most insidious falsehoods about wine that still gets passed around like fortune-cookie wisdom is that red wines should be served and drunk at room temperature.  If your “room temperature” is the thermostat reading inside a one-room stone cottage in the 1600s, you may be on to something, but otherwise you are doing your reds more harm than good if you follow this “standard” rule.  In my opinion (and that of every wine author whose book I’ve read), there is no dinner wine that shows best when served at 20-21 degrees Celsius (70-72 Fahrenheit)…and yet every time I go to a restaurant or a wine tasting and am presented with a glass of red, it tastes like it’s been stored in the furnace room or directly above the kitchen range (in a couple of places in town, it literally is!).  This, if you haven’t gathered already, is a huge pet peeve of mine. Read the rest of this entry »


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Categories : Tips & Tricks