Often times, it is not how good the wine is, but how good you store your wine that matters. To protect the quality of your wine, proper storage and good care are extremely important because these will directly affect the final character of your wine. Indeed, proper wine storage can always make all the difference. If you store it right, it can lead to euphoria; if you store it wrong, it can always lead to serious depression. Just imagine, what can be more disappointing than waiting for years to open a bottle of wine only to find that it is nothing but vinegar?
To properly store your wine, there are seven important factors that you need to consider, including storage temperature, fluctuation of storage temperature, storage humidity, ventilation, lighting, the angle of the bottle during storage, and the vibration of the bottle on the storage rack.
Factor #1: Storage Temperature
Storage temperature is the most important factor to consider when storing wine. Even if you’re storing wine for just a few weeks, the final quality of the wine can be greatly affected by the temperature at which it is stored. All wines, whether red or white, shall be stored between 45 ° - 60 °F at all times, with 50 ° - 55 ° being the optimal range. In this way, the low temperature can help to age the wine. At high storage temperature, wines age faster and the excessive heat may chemically damage the wine.
Factor #2: Temperature Fluctuation
In addition to maintaining the optimal storage temperature, it is important to keep any temperature fluctuations to a minimum. Fluctuation may cause the outside air to seep into the bottle and ruin the wine. Therefore, a properly stored wine only allows a very small fluctuation of the ideal storage temperature. It is usually recommended that the temperature shall not fluctuate more than 5 °F and that those fluctuations are rare and happens slowly.
Factor #3: Storage Humidity
Wines are best stored at the humidity level of 70%, though it is perfectly acceptable to keep it at 10% above or below 70%. High humidity (80% or higher) can cause the labels and cork to rot or mold. This can greatly affect the wine’s value. On the other hand, low humidity (50% or below) can cause the cork to dry out and shrink or crack, allowing air into the bottle and damage the wine in little or no time.
Factor #4: Ventilation
It should be noted that a cork doesn’t 100% seal your wine bottle. Outside air may always seep into the wine bottle through the cork. Therefore, be sure that you don’t store your wine with other substances like cleaning solvents, paint or other chemicals in which the odors may contaminate your wine.
Factor #5: Lighting
Wines like darkness. Light can always ruin any type of wine. This is why most wine bottles are tinted with dark colored glass- to allow only very little light to get to the wine. Light can cause the wine to age prematurely. Therefore, always store your wine out of direct sunlight and never store it in a well lit room.
 |
| Wines stored with cork facing down. |
Factor #6: Storage Angle
As mentioned earlier, air may get into the bottle if the cork dries out. To prevent this from happening, wine bottles should always be stored either horizontally or at 0 ° - 45 ° angle with the cork facing down. By doing this the wine is always in contact with the cork, preventing it from drying out.
Factor #7: Vibration
Vibrations are never a good thing for wine. Under frequent vibration, the sediment in the bottle becomes unsettled and can ruin the wine. To prevent damage from sediment, always store your wine in a place that is free of vibration. This will give ample time for the sediment to settle.
To achieve optimal storage condition and to protect the quality and investment of your wine collection, having a right kind of wine cellar is imperative. It doesn’t matter if you’re storing your wine for ten days or ten years, a good wine cellar is a must. The good news is, you don’t have to invest a lot of money in it. You can save thousands of Dollars building one on your own using the easy-to-follow guide, “Build Your Own Home Wine Cellar”. Build one to store your wine, and you can be assured real good wines after years of storage. Not vinegars!
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete