Some people like to decant almost all wines, except for sparkling (the bubbles would dissipate), the very old (they tend to disintegrate), and the very young and simple (extra air might make them fall apart, too). These people find that the extra oxygen helps bring out the aromas and flavors in the wine.

It’s hard to prove, but everyday experience gives the theory some strong support. Ever notice how some wines change in the glass? How they start out with almost no aroma and little taste, and then, 15 minutes or an hour later, startle with seductive scents and luscious flavor? Or how the leftovers in a bottle taste better the day after it was opened?

The opposite happens, too. A wine tastes great for the first 15 minutes, but as it sits in the glass, it begins to taste duller, more acetic, less pleasant, as if it’s falling apart by the minute. Or the leftovers taste awful the following day.

The change in a wine from bottle to decanter won’t be as drastic as from one day to the next, but it can be significant. The thing is, you can’t know for sure how a wine will react. If the wine is simple and juicy, aeration probably won’t improve it; if it’s tannic, acidic, and very dense with concentrated fruit, it well might. At home, you can experiment. At a restaurant, leave it up to the opinion of the wine steward, who should have an opinion about these things.

How to Decant

In the simplest situations—a young wine that you want to decant just for the benefit of some air or a pretty container—all that needs to be done is to dump the wine from bottle into decanter.

With an older wine, it’s more complicated. If the wine is a special one you ordered earlier in the day, the sommelier will have stood the bottle up in a quiet place for the sediment to fall to the bottom.

If you ordered it that night, he’ll just carefully take it from the cellar and move it into a decanting rack, if he has one, which keeps the bottle at an angle, or stand it up, endeavoring not to rile it up.

Then comes the entertaining part: Out comes a candle along with the decanter. Over the candle, he’ll slowly pour the wine into the decanter. The light the candle throws helps him see when the sediment begins to flow toward the neck, so he can stop pouring before it comes out.

Often this will leave an inch of wine in the bottle. It might seem like a waste, but it’s better than a mouthful of grit.

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In some restaurants, the staff doesn’t want to take the risk of having a customer drink a corked or flawed wine, so they do the tasting themselves. In this situation, expect the wine waiter to show you the bottle before it’s opened, and then take it away after you okay it. Then, at a station specifically set up for tasting wines, where there’s a spittoon for the sommelier so he doesn’t get a buzz on over the course of an evening, the sommelier will open and taste your wine. If it’s bad, he’ll get another bottle. If it’s sound, he’ll bring it back and pour it around. Seldom do sommeliers of this caliber call a wine wrong, but if you happen to get a bottle that has a major flaw he missed (it happens to the best of us), do bring it up.

Decanting

Why do some people get to drink their wine out of beautiful glass decanters while the rest of us get it poured straight out of the bottle?

Most wine doesn’t need decanting; pouring it straight from the bottle is fine. Some wines, however, have a thick layer of gritty sediment at the bottom of the bottle that you’d rather not end up in your glass.

Some people, too, think that some wines benefit from extra air contact, and pouring them into a wide-bodied container will do just that. (So will shaking a glass up and down vigorously with your hand cupped over the top, but that’s a little messy and doesn’t look so good.)

Which Wines?

Wines that typically benefit from decanting are those that have been bound up in their glass bottles for the longest. These wines are likely to have “thrown some sediment”— that is, to have a layer of tannins, pigments, and other compounds that have fallen out of the solution to the bottom of the bottle. Decanting helps keep the sediment out of your glass.

Old wines can also develop “reduced,” vegetal aromas, or seem to have very little aroma at all, after they’ve been hidden away from oxygen for so many decades. Putting an old wine in a decanter lets it “breathe” a bit, or literally sit in the presence of oxygen, so that its aromas and flavors slowly unfold. In a wine with very mature flavors, though, the amount of oxygen it comes in contact with while going into the decanter can blur the line between old wine and vinegar.

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A new romance is always so exciting.  So is a nice glass of wine.  So much to love!

The tradition has favored women throughout history, being the receivers of flowers and chocolate.  These days, it’s OK to impress your man, ladies.  We are quite easy!  A nice bottle of wine, or port for that matter, does the job.  I might be partial here, but walk with me for a second….

After a long February 14th at work, you both are exhausted.  The last thing you want to think about is your run-of-the mill flowers and chocolate, and only one person gets those. (The ladies get off so easy!  Guys - if you are getting flowers and chocolate, we need to have a chat.)  Though the flowers are gorgeous and the chocolates decadent….we both know they don’t last.

So let’s say you still go the flowers and chocolate route.  Now, throw in a nice bottle of 2007 Caro Amancaya Malbec from Argentina, some candles, served in Tiffany wine glasses…now you are on a whole new level!  It’s the perfect gift from guy to gal (and I tend to be a biased male wine-lover).   A memorable evening of wine that lasts.  And of course, wine has healthy antioxidants!  (So does dark chocolate, but let’s forget that for a moment.  But if you can’t, Scharffen Berger 82% Cacao is the perfect pairing with wine.)

A perfect Valentine’s evening awaits!  I wonder what my wife got me this year….

WCI out

International Wine, Red Wine argentina, chocolate, flowers, Malbec, scharffen berger, tiffany

You can’t send a wine back simply because you don’t like it. If you ordered it without asking for help, you’re assuming full responsibility for your choice, just as you would for food. If the selection was a recommendation from the wine waiter and you’re not happy with it, he may offer to find you something else, but he’s not obligated to—just as a waiter wouldn’t be expected to replace your entree with another one if it’s something he suggested.

In other instances, it’s perfectly acceptable to send the wine back, and you should expect it to be taken back without any argument.

If you ordered a wine at the same time you ordered your food, you have a reasonable right to expect that the wine will come to the table before the food arrives. If that’s the case and the wine arrives in the middle of the course, you can decline the bottle on the spot, before it’s opened.

When Good Wine Tastes Bad

It’s always a sinking feeling when you smell the splash of wine that the waiter’s poured for your tasting and find that the wine has spoiled. It might be corked (infected with TCA), or it might have turned to vinegar, or it might be refermenting. These things mean it’s ruined, and you’ll have the right to send it back. How do you recognize these faults? Like this:

• Corked wine: Sometimes it’s difficult to tell a corked wine from one that’s innocently musty, but often one whiff is all that it will take. A corked wine will smell like it’s been held in a cardboard box rather than in glass, or like an old, moldy attic. No tiling will repair this, and it won’t fade away, so you have to send it back.
• Vinegar: No wine should, by definition, smell like vinegar, so if a wine smells more appropriate for salad dressing than for sipping, send it back.
• Refermenting: Very occasionally, a wine will begin to referment in the bottle. This is an easy one to catch, as it will look fizzy, or at least bubble strangely on the tongue.

Sometimes a wine will have a vegetal or sulfurous stink to it; if it’s really bad (like it makes you cringe and pull back violently from the glass), that’s also grounds for refusal. But if it’s less disturbing than that, don’t worry it—those scents will probably dissipate as the wine sits in the glass.

If you’re not sure whether the wine is “sound,” that is, free of cork taint or any other problems, feel free to ask the wine waiter. He should be able to smell the wine and tell you. It’s his desire, of course, to see you enjoying your wine, so that you might order more and come back another time, or at least tell your friends about a great wine experience rather than a bad one at his restaurant.

It’s heartbreaking for a wine manager to clear a half-empty glass from a table at the end of the night and discover from a quick whiff that the wine was corked. There went an unhappy customer, no doubt, one whose wine troubles could have been avoided if only the wine guy had known. So speak up when you think the wine in your glass is faulty; it may well be, and then you can have it replaced.

Besides, restaurants can get a credit for the bad bottle from the distributor that sold it to them, so there’s no reason why the sommelier would want to see you drink a bad wine—and no reason you should feel guilty for sending it back.

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