im always hearing about the aging of wine…like keeping it in cellars, for long time. this whole "fine wine" thing.
i dont drink, so i know nothing about alcohol and im curious to know. does wine, at least the kind you would put in a cellar, expire at some point? how long can they be kept down there?
K.K (313) // Mar 31, 2010 at 5:41 am
no it doesnt expire the older the better.
StevE // Mar 31, 2010 at 5:41 am
if sealed properly , it shouldnt go off for quite a long time, if not sealed tho it can go off and taste quite horrible.
footyuk // Mar 31, 2010 at 5:41 am
It depends on the wine, but in general wine doesn’t expire. For example, some cheap wines, or fizzy wines (e.g. champagne), won’t get better with age, but a fine, red wine kept in the right conditions (right temperature and humidity, such as in a cellar like you say) will get better with age!
MonaLisa Overdrive AM VT wannabe // Mar 31, 2010 at 5:41 am
No wine lasts forever. They don’t "expire," but, over time, even in the best storage conditions, most lose their flavor and become tea-like. Even the finest wines have a point when they "peak," when they have just the right amount of age, and further aging diminishes teh flavor, rather than helping it. Most decent red wines improve most with 2 or 3 years of age. Unless you are buying a great wine, it will likely go downhill after about ten years (in a cellar.) A wines "greatness" is often measured by how long it can last, with the truly great still tasting wonderful after 50 years or more.
king_retro // Mar 31, 2010 at 5:41 am
a wine doesn’t expire as such but it can become ‘corked’ instead of tasting like the wine it should be is starts to taste like vinegar. Not all wines can be cellared, some are made to be drunk straight away and some will improve with cellaring. when you cellar wines it is to let it develop its characters., but the conditions have to be constant. it is no use storing wines if they are constantly subjected to fluctuating temperatures and humidity this is the best way to ‘cork’ wine. As with most things you pay for what you get, a cheap bottle won’t improve with cellaring some people see wine as an investment. if you get the right year the season has been good for the type of grapes lets say a case of henscke ‘hill of grace’ 1998 in its release year pick up for $100 a bottle making it $1200 with the right cellaring conditions at a wine auction could go for $6-800 a bottle
C_Millionaire // Mar 31, 2010 at 5:41 am
there’s no expiration date per se, but wine does eventually peak, and after that it will gradually lose its flavor and complexity. some wines can age and improve for well over a century. madeira (a fortified wine) can age for well over 200 years and still be good. a general rule of thumb is that a wine will remain at its peak for however long it took to get there.
good champagne does improve with age, most people don’t realize that because they’ve never tasted a really good champagne that’s been cellared for 10 or 15 years. just like still wine, it develops and improves.
haitchy0 // Mar 31, 2010 at 5:41 am
Generally speaking for a wine to keep for many years it needs to have lots of Fruit Flavours, High levels of Tannin and Good levels of Acidity. If you where to drink a glass of Chateau Haut Brion Bordeaux from a recent vintage such as 2008 the levels of Tannin and the Acidity would be awful. Wines such as these "Soften" over a period of 10 to 20 years and sometimes longer, and improve in Flavour and complexity. Even a great wine such as this would probably start to "turn" after 50 years. (I have 2 bottles of Haut Brion 1961 in the cellar at the Hotel i work at and a bottle opened 2 years ago was superb)
An exception to the rule of Fruit and Tannin is with Dessert wines such as Sauternes. Because the fruit is picked at optimum ripeness the naturally high levels of sugar after fermentation also help to keep the wine in good condition and a good bottle of Chateau d’Yquem Sauternes could last for 100+ years.
Basketball // Mar 31, 2010 at 5:41 am
it depends if the rats have got to it, but it should last