I agree with the sentiment, but, for me, it’s nice to have mid-term wines that are not necessarily “high end,” by most accounts, but that can’t be purchased at the corner shop and go with the kinds of food we prepare most of the time at home. A nice Lessona, Arbois Trousseau, basic Chianti and their like can be great with 7-14 yrs. I think of wine as part of dinner and the cellar as an extension of the kitchen pantry. Certainly one could satisfy all one’s needs from one region. Most people in wine-producing regions do. But given the range of wines available locally, I like to take advantage.
Edited to add: What I’ trying to get at is that the distinction between basic dinner wines and “high end” wines is fuzzier for me than it sounds like it is for a lot of people.
Ah, but notice I didn’t say anything about high end. I’m fine with aging things that are offbeat, middle of the pack stuff as long as it’s something I think will improve.
The distinction I was trying to tease out was that for some of us our cellar isn’t just longer term agers but really means “what we have in the house”
My cellar is an invaluable tool in the quest and it will be undergoing a secular rebalancing process for the foreseeable future as I make new discoveries that crowd out maintaining the previous balance of consumption and purchasing.
In respect to food, apertif, and party service, I can’t live without a wide range of Riesling, some Pinot, Sancerre/SB, Chablis and other Chards, some token Cab, Syrah (I love lamb/syrah) and Zinfandel, only some of which is going to last more than 5 years past vintage and all of which I like on their own as well. That wasn’t the original question but its the closest thing to a recommendation for avenues of exploration and hence rebalancing that I can think of. And I really ought to have more Gamay, Muscadet, and eclectic wines from Spain and Italy. 90% of one thing sounds boring to me. Or maybe I just can’t afford it proper Burgs.
Many intelligent things have been said.
Many of us are disturbed by the word “balanced”.
If you are asked : what is for you a “balanced” girlfriend, you will answer, as I would : I do not want a balanced girlfriend, I want a girlfriend who pleases me, with whom I feel well, and who has passions which fit mine.
And it can be translated towards a cellar. I do not want it “balanced”, I want it corresponding to my personality.
A cellar is a mirror of one’s personality.
As I have an excessive personality, being too weak when it concerns my passions, my cellar is excessive. But I have built a justification, which by chance, is true :
“you drink rare wines when you have many”. And as I want to drink rare wines, this justifies that I have many.
If someone has in his cellar a Haut-Brion 1928 which is the only 1928 that he has, he will never drink it, because it will never be the proper moment to open it. It someone has hundreds of 1928’, the fact to open a Haut-Brion 1928 will not represent the same anxiety.
So, my cellar is organized to be “unbalanced”, in order to push me to open rarities.
Of course I make mine many comments made above, but I wanted to add my grain of salt on one point : “you open many if you have many”.
Agree absolutely with Francois.
It doesn´t make any sense to buy and cellar wines that you won´t like – or at least that you won´t try someday.
I sold all my Italian wines 10+ years ago because I never took one … always preferred a French or Austrian wine.
So my cellar is absolutely NOT balanced because French and Austrian wines (the latter mainly white) make up 99%.
BUT it is – as far as possible until today – balanced in terms of vintages – which is IMHO the most important thing. Sure I would like to have more aged wines and older vintages, but unfortunately I´m not Francois
you should buy wines you love or at least like
you should try to have an appropriate stock of wines in your preferable drinking window
So if you like aged wines you should either try to buy more mature vintages – or to buy more young vintages than you need for current drinking – and in 10, 20+ years you will have enough aged wines …
BUT if you like young fruity wines you should NOT buy more than you can drink in a certain time …
OK, if you need certain wines for invitations and social events, you should have a certain stock. But it is nonsense to stock up in e.g. Champagne or Port … if you don´t like Champagne or Port – and only need it for one invitation a year.
Balanced for me means: If I´m going to buy not a single bottle anymore I still can drink comfortably over the next 15+ years …
So my cellar is excessive in a certain way, too … the only regret is: it´s already too small to keep apropriate order … otherwise I´m quite happy with it!
My one piece of advice would be to taste examples of all of those wines with some age on them. Make sure you like how they taste X years out (X being however long you want to keep them and may well be a different number for each type).
So much good stuff, I’ll only add that when balancing one’s cellar, remember age is a factor, esp with wines of longevity (big burgs, bords, rhones).
If you became a winelover with, say, 2000 Bordeaux, I hope you bought other vintages of Bordeaux because most of those wines still aren’t ready. It is quite miserable to wait a decade for your cellar to come around to fruition or to drink the wines before they really express themselves (at least to my palate).
Generally keep a cellar that is to my personal liking, stronger in some regions than others (Burgundy, Bordeaux, and California, and to a smaller degree, Rhone, Sauternes, Reisling, etc.) Like others have mentioned, keep younger as well as older wines per region.
That said, will “balance” out the cellar with wines that I may not have a strong personal passion, but know friends and guests will enjoy when they visit. A good example is Champagne. Do not mind a bottle now and again, and have enjoyed some nice ones, just not a big fan overall.
Matt - to add my 2 cents - buy only highly-rated wines.
That way, anyone you know will be impressed. If you like the wine yourself, that’s irrelevant. You might end up with a cellar full of wine that you like and that won’t impress a single friend. How embarrassing when someone comes over and you don’t have a name wine for him (unlikely to be a her).
And I disagree with Enzo. Top producers from top years?
No.
Just go with the top producers. If you open d’Yquem, do you think people will carp about the vintage or do you think they’ll go “Ooh, ooh, it’s d’Yquem!”
Anyhow, that’s how you end up with a “balanced” cellar.
Personally, like most of the other posters here, I don’t give a shit if my cellar is “balanced” as long as it has wine I like.
There’s one small portion of my collection where I deviate from my favorites. I usually try to keep a handful of solid wines around of styles pleasing to my closest friends. Even if it’s not entirely my cup of tea, sometimes it’s much more enjoyable to share a wine that thrills the guest that evening. It drives me to keep a few more “big reds” on hand than I would otherwise, and I’m happy with how it’s working so far.
Having a mix of wines that represents the relative patterns of my consumption: easy.
Avoiding occasional forced binges to clear a bubble of wines that are all in danger of decline if not consumed: hard.
The worst culprit that makes that second axis of balance difficult to maintain is that some wines develop at a different pace than I anticipated when I bought them or sampled along the way. Another sabot in the works is the premox plague.
My storage started out with mostly BDX and Cali Cabs.
I wanted wines that had potentially wide drinking windows that I could acquire at what was affordable.
Then I started getting ports and vintage champagnes.
Most of what remains are either sentimental favorites, some birthyear wines, anniversary dates (my wife was born in 61’, we were married in 90’ for example) and somethings I set aside to check in on when I wax nostalgic.
Probably 80% of what I “cellar” are still cab, BDX, port and bubbles.
But, I did start adding diversity. Back in late 80’s early 90’s I went to Willamette Valley, so Pinots. Wanted to see how local stuff compared, so ended up w/ RR/Cali Pinot and French Burg. Needed some sweets for dessert because the girls didn’t like my port. Boom I ended up with Auslese, Tokays and more Sauternes.
Then I met these stinking Beserkers, and whoa!, Syrah, Rhones are crowding out the BDX and Cabs now. These are competing with space from Brunellos, Barolos, Priorats and Tempranillos. B’days and anniversaries fly by to drain off the old BDX, the 90 bubbles, the 80’s and 90’s cabs. The wines may be gone, but the memories remain.
I don’t think I ever had an intentional “cellar plan”, but I am thankful that I can pretty much pull any bottle, any time and have a nice drink. I keep no trophies, most of what I have are what I wish to share. That is my ideal cellar.
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