Wine Tip – Stayin’ Alive

May 25th, 2009 | Author: Mark

Here’s a question that I’ve been asked quite a bit: Exactly how long will a wine stay fresh after opening it?

My answer- I don’t know. No one can accurately answer that question because there are too many variables involved. The only piece of valuable information that I can provide you with is that every wine begins to decline the minute that you open it. Air is every wine’s worst enemy. The more air that gets into it, the faster it will decline. It’s best to immediately recork the wine if you’re not planning on drinking the entire bottle that day.

My rule of thumb is to drink both your white and red wines within 1-2 days after initially opening them. It may not taste quite like the same wine on day 2, but it will probably still be pretty good.

Something else to consider is that grapes with high levels of acidity like Riesling, Sauvignon Blanc, and Torrontes usually have the ability to hold it together a little bit longer than other types of grapes. Additionally, sweet wines that are high in alcohol content like sherry and port are also strong survivors.

So if you have leftovers, here are a few things that you can do to prolong a wine’s life:

1.) Recork and refrigerate all white wines.

2.) Recork red wines as best you can, and I would recommend drinking it the very next day. After that, consider it cooking wine.

3.) If you’re really serious about trying to prolong the life of a wine, consider purchasing a wine bottle vacuum pump or stoppers. These wine gadgets claim to suck out air and prolong a wine’s life. A commonly used pump and stopper gadget is The Vacu Vin Wine Saver .