Storing opened red wine?

You've cracked open a delicious bottle of red wine, but it's nowhere near empty. So what? You know that the wine is often not nearly as flavorful the next day.

What can you do about that?

The solution is simple: the bottle is vacuumed using a small pump and a rubber stopper. This helps, though not as much as we always thought.

Research has shown that manually vacuuming a bottle helps only a little. There is a way to keep opened bottles of wine longer, namely in the refrigerator or cooler. Red wines, in particular, that come into contact with oxygen deteriorate rapidly, but in the refrigerator, the quality declines much less quickly. This is especially true for oak-aged red wines, such as an oak-aged Rioja.

Such wines oxidize very quickly and are often undrinkable just a day after opening. However, if the wine is chilled after the bottle has been vacuum-sealed, it turns out to be perfectly drinkable even after a few days, as the oxidation process has been slowed down.

So the wine deteriorates much less rapidly. Do keep in mind, however, that the wine needs to reach room temperature first.

Cheers!

Sanne Schilstra
Sales Manager Wijnhandel Dikkers Groningen

Sanne has been a sommelier in top hospitality establishments in the northern Netherlands for many years, is a hospitality expert, and has an immense passion for wine and hospitality. Sanne will write a monthly column for Horeca Groningen.