How long do old bottles take to open up
0I’m sure every bottles different but is there any rule of thumb as to how long you should give an old bottle to open up? For example, I have a 20 year old Wellington victory 3 liter that I want to serve at a party some time, so how long before the party should I pop the cork? What about even older bottles. Thanks for any advice!
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This would be a good question for @PeterW or @rpm.
I’m always hesitant to pop open an old bottle too early in case it starts off excellent but fades really quickly. That’s the (potential) catch-22.
As you said, it varies widely. A 20 year old Wellington 3 L, I would give 1/2 hour to 45 minutes. Large bottles age more slowly, so risk is less. My rule of thumb for Cab is no more than decanting time for wines at 30+, no more than 1/2 hour at 20+, ~ 1 hour at 10-20 years, 2 hours under 10. All subject to producer, vintage character, storage, condition, appellation, etc.
@rpm Interesting - would you apply the same approx guidelines to say a Bordeaux?
I wouldn’t open a (quality) Bordeaux before 15 - 20, otherwise pretty much. I’d let Pauillac breathe a bit more than eg St Estephe or St Julien, in most cases.
Have a Venturi or other aerator. When you open a bottle, pour a bit through the Venturi a couple times, and taste. This gives you a sneak preview of where it’s going to go. I’ve had a couple of bottles where the wine tasted fine pop 'n pour, but the sneak preview through the Venturi indicated it wasn’t going to last long. So we kept it in the bottle and polished it off quickly.
If the bit of wine through the Venturi a couple times tastes fine (or even better), then decant and take your time drinking. Due to bottle variation, the same wine from the same year can be in different situations.
@PatrickKarcher I’m not sure I’d use a Venturi on anything other than a wine that is being drunk much too young. YMMV. In my experience, careful decanting is the only appropriate aeration for older wines.
@PatrickKarcher @rpm But do you think running an ounce through to see how it takes to oxygen could be indicative of the effects of a longer decant? That’s an intriguing possibility to me, because if that holds then I could open a well aged wine early, test it, decide whether/how long to decant, and then have it at its near optimum.
100% agreed that it would be a terrible idea for drinking the wine.
@klezman @PatrickKarcher Haven’t tried it, Klez. If you have the 20+ year old Corison bottle to experiment on, I’d love to hear the result…
@PatrickKarcher @rpm Maybe with an old and inexpensive bottle of Bordeaux…
@klezman @PatrickKarcher Not a valid experiment: rarely are 20+ year old inexpensive Bordeaux interesting.
@PatrickKarcher @rpm 1999 Lanessan might be interesting enough. But I take your point.
It’s really just an intriguing proposition since I never open up an older wine early enough to let it breathe just in case it’s close to falling off a cliff. Then on the other hand I know that some older wines can really open up with even several hours in a decanter.
@klezman @PatrickKarcher @rpm
Would this any make sense to try with, say, some late 90’s vintages of Ardente, Arbios or some of the York Creek that Cathy made?
Last weekend I opened a 2008 K Vintners Royal City Syrah, a gift from my boss, a nicer wine than we can afford to drink. After opening, it certainly tasted aged. I put a few sips through the Venturi a couple times, and it tasted . . . fantastic. This gave me the confidence to put the rest into the decanter and take our time.
I think some of you can taste a wine, and have enough knowledge, to know if and how long to decant it. I don’t, so this helps.