"They Say Wine Gets Better As It Ages, I Find the More I Age the More I Like Wine."

A Blog Post on the Art of Storing and Drinking Vino! 

To Learn More about How to Store Wine .  This site will let you know where, why, how and the what about storing wine.

When first introduced to alcohol I would not drink wine. Besides being introduced to an atrociously cheap wine via a supermarket bought box wine, I had a phobia of anything pretentious (which on hind sight was an ironic position to hold while attending liberal arts school).  Anything above cheap beer was a scam to my naive perceptions.  Then I met my fiance who persistently introduce to me to delicious varieties of wine, starting with Malbecs.

We have plans to cellar wines for long-term for the first time. I have hopes of collecting a bottle of Syrah each year from my favorite Maryland vineyard, Black Ankle, and then having a tasting years from now to taste the actual process of aging.  I realize this is not a controlled experiment, but it will be a fun one I think.  I suppose I see in 10 years from now!   So I am one of the lucky ones who have a convenient and healthy environment to store wine.  Not everyone is so lucky, and have to seek wine storage.

First thing is first though.  I want to debunk any notion that some may have that ALL wine gets better with age.  This is simply not true, and most wine is made to be enjoyed right away.  It was one of the reasons I though wine was sort of pretentious, because  I couldn't imagine at the time living somewhere long enough to store my booze. Later I would learn some of the nuances to wine storage. Wines that are supposed to be aged may be great right now, and some wine even go down hill if you age them.  Also, if a wine was stored improperly while aged, it may turn by the time you get to drinking it.  And lets face it, sometimes we just don't want to wait to enjoy that Pinot Noir from California or whatever your delicious and divine poison may be from.

The best way to find out how long to store a wine (or if to) is from the winemaker.  Not all of us can be lucky enough to be located near all our favorite vineyards.  And as much as I dream of living in the Colombia Gorge (my favorite wine region in the world) in Oregon, I know I couldn't take the constantly rainy weather nor afford to pick up my east coast lifestyle and leave to the west coast.  If you buy your wine from a store regularly, ask the owner of the store.  Hopefully you have found a good wine store with someone who knows their stuff.  If you haven't found someone who knows about their wine, I recommend you search for a wine store that offers at least some knowledgeable staff.  Not just because you want someone to tell you how long to store a wine, but you also need someone who will point you towards the best wines in their stores in your price range.  People who are in the business to sell wine are frequently passionate about the wine, and aren't necessarily in it for JUST the money.  Use them as a resource, they want to be used!

Anyways, Why We Store Wine


One word, tannin.  Tannin is the substance that comes from the stems, seeds and skins of grapes.  Tannin also comes from the barrels that wine is aged in wineries.  Tannins serve as a preservative for wine, so that it can undergo the aging process.  As the wine ages the harshness, bitterness of the tannin will become sediment in the bottom of the bottle reveal the flavors, fruit, acidic, mineral, etc, more in the open for the palate.
Red wines are generally the ones that get better with age, because of the large amount of tannin present in these robust wines.  If you drink it too young it may taste a little too harsh, but after storing it for some odd years the complexities of the flavors will come to the foreground.  Personally, me and the fiance like the bitter taste of fairly young red wines, but that isn't for everyone.  If you like your coffee black and your chocolate dark you may have the same preferences.
Red wines get their color from the skin of the grape and skin, and white wines don't have the same contact with skin and stem.  This means that they do not have the tannin present to preserve their flavors.