Closed Dinner Wine Conundrum

Michael K said about a 2000 chablis:
"When it was first opened, it was tight, austere to the point of tasting like water in the mid palate with a metal tinge. But after about 4 hours in the bottle, man what a transformation, deep, complex, with truffle, minerals, some funkiness, and on the palate much the same but great texture and great balance."

Don't know that I'd ever expect this prior to opening a 2000 vintage white!

So, seriously, I am just curious, when WLDG folks pop a bottle of wine to have with dinner and perceive that it isn't showing much what do they do? Put the food back in the oven for 3 or 4 hours to keep it warm and watch a movie? Chalk it up to Murphy's Law and drink it anyway, or seal it up with nitrogen gas and keep popping bottles until you find the one that sings. This wine thing is getting so complicated!

[David M. Bueker]

Splash decant & hope for the best. Or open a different bottle if possible.

If a very or even relatively young wine shows completely closed on opening, to consider splash decanting.
If a moderately mature white (such as the 2000 Chablis in question) to decant by allowing the wine to gently hit and circle the inner walls of the decanter.
If a moderately mature red shows closed to let it open in the glasses, perhaps serving a complimentary wine to drink as poured and watch the other as it opens
If a seriously mature white or red my own preference is to open the bottle 1 - 2 hours in advance, not to decante but to pour gently into the glass (my hypothesis being that if you can decant gently enough into a decanter to avoid the sediment falling, you can pour equally carefully)

Best
Rogov

So, seriously, I am just curious, when WLDG folks pop a bottle of wine to have with dinner and perceive that it isn't showing much what do they do? Put the food back in the oven for 3 or 4 hours to keep it warm and watch a movie? Chalk it up to Murphy's Law and drink it anyway, or seal it up with nitrogen gas and keep popping bottles until you find the one that sings. This wine thing is getting so complicated!

Depends on the meal. If it's a serious dinner party or something with guests, it always helps to either have recent experience with the wines or some idea of what to expect from friends/retailers/wine boards, etc.

When it's just me and my wife, it's less important because we can open something else or even just slow down the drinking until it (hopefully) opens up later or after the meal. Either way, we'll eat, we'll drink, and we'll learn something. No big deal.

Well, I suppose I could cobble together a workable protocol from the appreciated suggestions above, however, when presented with such a neat convenient solution, recommended from on high, I guess my prayers have been answered. Thank goodness I don't have a pacemaker! Wine just got simpler again, and for only $34.95!


"After trying the Wine Collar with a number of different wines, I am convinced that it actually works. It has a significant effect on wines – especially young red ones – and instantly improves drinkability by softening tannins. You have definitely made a believer out of this skeptic."
— Anthony Dias Blue,
Wine and Spirits Editor,
Bon Appétit Magazine


Wine Clip Magnet
When normally skeptical (and notoriously hard to impress) wine critic and judge Anthony Dias Blue goes out of his way to praise anything, I pay attention. He’s the highly respected former Wine and Spirits Editor of Bon Appétit magazine, and we’ve followed his wine recommendations for years with superb results. He’s also the Executive Director of the San Francisco International Wine Competition (without question the most influential wine judging event in North America). So when Anthony personally brought to my attention the magnetic Wine Clip, I immediately taste-tested it.

Simply pouring a glass with the Wine Clip in place has an immediate and salutary effect on wine molecules. The power of the Neodymium magnets both breaks down large astringent tannins, and accelerates aeration — much like decanting — resulting in a smoother, softer and more balanced taste. The improvement is obvious, easily verified, and improves flavor and bouquet as you pour! To my palate, the Wine Clip makes any pedestrian $15 bottle of wine approach the taste of Reserve or Estate-Bottled vintages costing $30, $40, $50 or more per bottle. Should be kept away from electronic equipment such as computers and pace makers.

Personally I think a majority of the "opening up" most wines do over several hours has to do with the opening up of our own palate, the serving of food, and the loosening up due to consumption of alcohol. Not to mention the possible temperature change of white wines. Of course all wines will behave differently.

Wines with disagreeable odors that show promise of eventually blowing off present a similar challenge. At one's home or at a restaurant the solution for either one could be most any of those suggested in this thread, but what to do when the sleeping or stinking bottle is opened by one's host? The problem then becmes a diplomatic one. My way out is to say something like, "What a wonderful wine! What potential! I think it will be perfect if we just let it breathe a while."

Re: Wine Clip Magnet

"After trying the Wine Collar with a number of different wines, I am convinced that it actually works. It has a significant effect on wines – especially young red ones – and instantly improves drinkability by softening tannins. You have definitely made a believer out of this skeptic."
— Anthony Dias Blue,
Wine and Spirits Editor,
Bon Appétit Magazine

You know, I just had a really heretical thought. If folks can taste the ocean in wines produced from grapes grown near the coast, as I've read in numerous tasting notes, if the components of the soil that grapes are grown in can be detected in the wine those grapes produce, is it perhaps possible that powerful magnets can alter the taste of a wine?

Any brave soul out there who has tried this device and is willing to weather the reaction to that admission?

Indeed I tried the miraculous wine magnet. I will not waste anyone's time by going into details of how I did that (not particularly replicable research but it did involve blind tastings of same wines treated and untreated by the marvellous thing). To sum up in one highly technical term: "Bullshit". In four equally techinical terms: "Pure and unadulterated bullshit".

Also in the line of work I have tried what Eisch used to call "breathable glasses". Same summary.



Ye faithful curmudgeon
Rogov

"Bullshit". In four equally techinical terms: "Pure and unadulterated bullshit".


Well Daniel, certainly no waffling there! Anybody out there agree with Mr. Blue? After all, oxygen affects wine, temperature affects wine, brett affects wine, why not magnetism?

How about the Vinturi? It makes a little bit of sense because the wine seems to perk through the device and I would thing it's just a way to aerate wine quicker.