Do you have to worry about how and where to
store wine? Not really. More than 95 percent of
wine is ready to drink straight from the shelf and
most are actually consumed within 24 hours of
purchase. If you do not have a cellar—and most
people do not—then there really is no need to
store wine. However, if you want to keep a few
bottles for convenience, common sense will tell
you to place it somewhere relatively cool and
dark. On the other hand, if you are determined to
built up a cellar of wine (and for the enthusiast,
there is nothing more enjoyable), then there are
some very important factors to consider,
principally temperature and light
TEMPERATURE
While 52°F (11°C) is supposed to be the perfect storage
temperature for wine, anything between 40°F and 65°F (5°C and
18°C) will, in fact, suffice for most styles of wines, providing there
is no great temperature variation over a relatively short period of
time. Higher temperatures increase the rate of oxidation in a
wine, therefore a bottle of wine stored at 65°F (18°C) will
gradually get “older” than the same wine stored at 52°F (11°C).
However, a constant 59°F (15°C) is far kinder to wine than
erratic temperatures that often hit 52°F (11°C), but fluctuate
between 40°F and 65°F (5°C and 18°C) from one day to the
next. Such rapid changes in temperature cause the cork to
shrink and expand, which can loosen the closure’s grip on the inner surface of the bottle’s neck, rendering the wine liable to
oxidation through exposure to the air.
LIGHT
All wines are affected negatively by the ultraviolet end of the
light spectrum, but some of the harmful photochemical effects
this causes can be reversed by cellaring a light-affected wine in
darkness for a few months. Brown or dead-leaf colored wine
bottles offer more natural protection from
ultraviolet light than those that are made of
traditional green glass. But dark green is
better than light green, whereas blue and
clear is the most vulnerable (which is why
Roederer Cristal is wrapped in protective
yellow cellophane).
While it is perfectly okay to buy wine for
everyday drinking (or even for keeping a few
months) off a well-lit supermarket shelf, if
you want to keep a wine much longer, you
should avoid any bottles displayed in sunlight
or under artificial lighting. Ask instead for
bottles of the same wine that are still in their
cartons in the storeroom.
OTHER FACTORS
A certain humidity (between 60 and 70
percent) is essential to keep the cork moist
and flexible, thereby avoiding oxidation. This
is one reason why long-term storage in a domestic refrigerator should be avoided—the refrigeration
process dehumidifies. Several days in a refrigerator is okay but
much longer than this, and the cork will start to dry out. Wines
should also be stored under vibration-free conditions, but this
only becomes a significant factor over a long period for sparkling
wines and mature wines with sediment.
The position in which a wine bottle is
stored is also extremely important. Most wines
should be stacked on their sides to keep their
corks moist, and therefore fully swollen and
airtight. Exceptions to this rule are sparkling
wines and any wine that has been sealed with
a screwtop lid. Champagne and any other
sparkling wine may be safely stored in an
upright position because the carbonic gas
(CO2
) trapped in the space between the top
of the wine and the base
of the cork provides more-than-sufficient
humidity to keep a sparkling-wine cork moist
and swollen. Screwtop lids require no
moistening, of course.
