Someone asked me yesterday how can anybody possibly tell whether a wine is still good in the bottle after storing it in the cellar for many years, without opening it.
The answer in its simplest form is that you will never really know until you do open it.
However, I posited a few tricks that will help weed out bad wines over the years so you don’t end up storing stuffed bottles.
- I like to turn my bottles (especially reds) once a year. There are professionals who believe this is unnecessary and that it will age your wine prematurely, though I disagree with the last point entirely. The point of turning the wine is to ensure that no part of the wine ages more rapidly than the rest and that the air inside the bottle is occasionally mixed with the wine. Note that it will stir up any sediment that has formed in the wine, so don’t turn a bottle that you want to try that week.
- Check the neck of the bottle for “ullage”. Ullage is the point at which the wine meets the air in the neck of the bottle. I mark this point with a nicko pen when I turn my bottles yearly. Over years, ullage will probably increase as wine is slowly evaporated through the cork (this is normal). Abnormal ullage can occur if wine seeps through the cork at a fast rate (can be the result of over-heating of the bottle) or a faulty cork. Either of these two problems will make your wine go bad and fast.
- I also check the amount of sediment in the reds. If it looks like the bottle is half sediment, it’s probably time to drink it.
- Check the cork. Give it a tiny push and make sure it isn’t too “squishy”. A wet cork can turn a wine if mould is allowed to reproduce (cork taint). That said, you don’t want a dry cork either. A dry cork doesn’t allow any air in or out of the bottle and your bottle will have trouble aging. Dry corks can also crack and split, allowing too much air flow, which is murder to a wine (over-oxidises).
- Check the floor of the cellar for drips or stains of wine. This is a good indicator that a bottle above the stain is leaking. Leaking wines (cork or stelvin cap) do not forbode well and should be drunk that week!
Before drinking any wine, be sure to sniff it in the glass to check for cork taint (that smell of wet hessian, mould, mustiness). If you detect this, throw it out.