Cellering Wine

HOW TO CELLER WINE

Every article, wine storage salesman, vintner, etc., will tell you that the best way to store wine is in a cool, dark, moist location. It is true. Cool, dark, and moist is the best. If you can do it, do it. No question.

What if you can’t? What if you do not have a spot that is always cool, or moist? Dark isn’t hard, but that is probably the least important of the three (given the colored bottles most wine comes in these days). The most important is coolness, and then that might translate into a temperature that is steady, at least. So what if you do not have a spot that is a fairly steady temperature and maybe not moist, do you not put aside wine?

Well, no. It means that you won’t have the absolute best results. Might you have results you’ll be happy with? My experience is, yes. Store wine, especially red wine. My experience is that white does not put up with less than ideal conditions as well as reds. Reds can put up with a lot.

I have stored wine in a closet, a small closet, small enough that when I got three cases it was full across the bottom. When you opened the closet there was wine. I eventually had about 300 bottles in it, and the entire room smelled of wine. Wow! It had the same climate control I had, air conditioning and heat. It was in Dallas. This situation lasted about four years. Then they got moved a few times. For about four years I did have ideal storage space. They never got overheated. Some of those bottles I kept for over twenty years and they tasted great.

Speaking of taste, aged wines do not taste like young wines. For the red, the tannins disapate (probably the wrong word), the wine becomes smoother, fruit lessens, flavors become more complex and deepen, aftertaste lengthens. It is a tasting experience that few wine lovers allow themselves. It is worth the wait, even for cheap wines.

The wines that I kept for so many years were petite Bordeaux, which were made for aging. I also held for a long time some Oregon pinot noir, which did very well.

I would suggest that the cheaper reds should be drunk after only a few years, some as little as one. But even then, they will improve, and give you a nice reward for your patience.

Putting aside a few bottles on a regular basis over the years and letting them mature is going to more enjoyable than not doing it just because you do not have ideal storage. Treat yourself. Enjoy aged wine. Age cheap wine, age mid-priced wine. Well, if you can afford expensive wine, buy yourself a wine storage unit. Age some red wine. You’ll be very happy.