Wine is a topic that may rouse such curiosity that leaves you in awe. When people start asking all manner of questions about wine, you will sure need more than time, speech and knowledge to elaborate everything in detail. Storage is one major concern for people who love wine. Evidently, good and tasty wine comes about with age. The manner in which the wine is stored influences its final quality when served. Well, questions that revolve around storage of wine have a lot to do with the kind of cellar that you have in the first place.
Cellars that give the wine an optimal condition always give the finest wine in the end. To say the least, ideal and constant temperature, perfect humidity, little darkness and efficient ventilation are the pillars of a good wine cellar. You deserve the best wine if you give your best shot at improving your cellar conditions. Some of the conventional issues that you may face regarding cellars entail the following:
Wine positioning
At the cellar, how you store and position your wine contributes to two things. You can either achieve an ultimately savory wine from good age or an average old wine bottle with just wine. When positioning the wine, it is quite vital to ensure that it is horizontal. This keeps the wine in contact with the cork. Essentially, when the cork dries out because the wine is vertically placed, it shrinks and creates space for air to enter. Air is not particularly the best for wine.
With time, it completely turns it into vinegar, which is good for other purposes. Another vital point to note is leaving the wine in their original wooden packages when you store them in the cellar. Conversely, sparkling wine and champagne may do well in vertical position. Usually, carbon dioxide is naturally produced and settles at the neck of the bottle as a layer preventing air from coming into contact with the wine.
Optimal temperature
Temperatures need to be constant even if there is a slight change. 12-16 degrees centigrade are the recommendable temperatures for wine. Degree and speed of change in temperature have their effects on the wine. On the positive side, a change that mostly happens over summer and winter seasons does no harm to your wine. On the contrary, daily change in temperature rapidly may affect your wine by increasing its aging rate. Though not a rule of thumb, ensure that you avert great fluctuations of temperature as you store the wine.
Humidity
Natural cork seal is an essential part of the wine bottle and needs the right level of humidity. Adverse changes in humidity prove a good enemy for the natural cork seal. Moderate humidity keeps the cork in a perfectly resilient state and far from shrinking. Low humidity generally causes harm to the wine by drying out the cork and causing it lose its elasticity.
Air ends up into the bottle and ruins your precious wine consequently. Sadly, this happens irrespective of the wine’s positioning (vertical or horizontal positioning). Good and mere tips may however, make things work out especially if the wine is in a confined place. In that regard, all you need is a bucket of water, which increases the humidity of the place with time as it naturally evaporates into the air.
Exposure to sunlight
Light brings about premature aging of a bottle of wine. The clearer the bottle, the highly susceptible it will be to the light menace. The disturbing fact is ultraviolet (UV) rays penetrate even through the darkest bottles reaching the wine eventually. Ultraviolet (UV) degrades the stable organic compounds of wine resulting to damage.
Tannins for instance, are the organic compounds that contribute to a wine`s structure, aroma and savor. UV affects them upon contact leaving your wine flat and thin. Fluorescent lights give out UV and are ideally unfit for a cellar. Quite contrary to that, sodium vapor and incandescent lights do not give out UV hence a workable alternative. Furthermore, you may consider ideal furniture for your cellar to keep off light. Howard Miller wine furniture do not let light or UV through if placed in the right location of a home (away from direct sunlight or UV) keeping your wine safe and secure.
Quality of the wine
It is highly advisable that you steer off conventional misconceptions such as improving bad wine with age or cooking it as an alternative. Most certainly, even if you keep bad wine in the right condition it will still be bad wine after a decade. Cooking, on the other hand, does nothing much but ruin your good meal. Just keep great wine in good condition and that is all.
Great wine storage goes a long way to maintain wines’ health. Every time you need a glass of wine, you will certainly and gladly get one because you possess its worth and taste in a good storage cellar.
