You don’t have to keep a bottle upright to decant off its sediment. As soon as you start pouring the bottle, you’ve just put the thing on its side anyway, so what was the point of standing it up for a month? Just take the bottle from the cellar, decant slowly and carefully, and you’ll get it off the sediment just as well as if it had been upright. If you want to be extra-precious about it, you can transfer it directly from side storage to a bottle cradle and uncork it there so it stays in a similar resting position the entire time, but it’s not really necessary.
That doesn’t work with Nebbiolo, Keith, and sometimes not with Pinot. They can have very fine, suspended sediment that takes a very long time to settle. It’s completely different from cab or Syrah sediment.
Works with any wine. The sediment is perfectly settled on the side of the bottle, which is the bottom of the bottle when the bottle is on its side, which is the position you’re pouring from.
How old a wine are you talking about?
Anywhere from zero to a hundred years old or so
The problem I have with this is when the sediment is on the entire side of the bottle, you are pouring the wine across it, so there’s a long stretch of sediment that is exposed to flowing wine. For most wines this doesn’t make much of a difference, as the sediments are coarser and tend to tack down. But wines with fine sediment are easily stirred up, and to me this is an inferior method. If the sediment is settled at the bottom, when you carefully decant, it is a long time before the wine from the bottom gets to the neck. If you are a careful decanter, you stop at that time.
Doesn’t matter how fine the sediment is, if gravity is capable of settling it on the bottom of the bottle, it’s also capable of keeping it on the underside of the bottle when the bottle is in a sideways position being poured. By contrast, if you’re worried about disturbing fine sediment, what do you think happens when a bottle with a heap of sediment around the punt is turned sideways for pouring? Sediment avalanche!
In my experience, when loose sediment is collected in the bottom of the bottle, the “avalanche” doesn’t reach the opening until all but the last few ounces are poured. When it’s layered along the side of the bottle, it will also stay put until the last few ounces as long as it hasn’t been disturbed by standing the bottle upright during the process of retrieving it from the cellar and opening it.
When you stand up an old Barolo, the sediment is disturbed and can take weeks to resettle. I’ve always wondered why.
Barolo isn’t noticeably thicker than other wines, so the liquid itself shouldn’t offer more resistance to settling. The sediment particles seem smaller than those in other varieties, so they shouldn’t offer a greater surface area to slow their descent. Are the particles flat rather than round, making them slower to settle? Could it be that the sediment’s specific gravity is lower and closer to that of the wine than in other varieties?
Is fine sediment due to wines having less color pigmentation, (one of the building blocks of sediment?
As David points out wine cradles are cheap (I think I got mine for ~$40 on Amazon? Nothing fancy, but it works), which is what, maybe 1/4th or less of what a single bottle of typical aged Nebbiolo I’m opening costs? And it allows me to open any aged Nebbiolo I have in the cellar at a moment’s notice without taking up any space. I’m living in a NY apartment where my onsite storage is a Eurocave, and I have either no space or very limited space within the fridge to stand up bottles, depending on how full it is. So for me at least there is no other option.
Happily, old Barolo and old Burgundy was only rarely put in bottles with deep punts!
I’ve got a 49 year old Barolo waiting to be popped. I’ll probably open it up next spring for my birthday when the bottle hits 50 years. I’ll have to keep all this in mind.
It depends what you mean by old I suppose. I’ve had a fair few problems with very fine sediment in bottles from the '20s-'50s, particularly from LdH and CVNE. A bunch of Tondonia '34 that I bought a few years ago took three months to settle - they looked cloudy for so long that I thought they must be cooked but when they eventually cleared they were amazing!
I agree with some of this, but I do think it’s important with very fine sediment (as in Nebbiolo) to keep the bottle somewhat on its side while carrying and opening, which is not all that easy without a basket/cradle. Standing up to open and then returning to its side can stir up sediment. I have a friend who swears by settling in bottles at about 45 degrees for at least several weeks, ideally months. He seems to get the best results with this method (totally clear wine with very little left behind). Sediment all around the bottom of the bottle, rather than only in one corner, does not seem optimal. I actually think keeping the bottle on its side is better than totally standing up if done properly.
Exactly. I keep some old bottles on a top rack where they probably rest at about a 15 degree angle. All the sediment gathers in the backside of the bottle up to about 3 or 4 inches from the bottom. There is almost no wine sacrificed to decanting - it’s clear ruby wine from the first drop to the last and nothing left in the bottle except the sludge.
I just ordered 6 of these ($5.99 ea) for my “on deck” Nebs. I think they will be a better alternative to standing upright in the cellar for a couple of weeks.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07RMTPXGF/ref=ppx_od_dt_b_asin_title_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Still hoping an advice on these “seeming already too old” Settimo Rocche 2009 and Settimo Rocche Riserva 2009.
See here :50 italian wines (report in french) - WINE TALK - WineBerserkers
I just responded over there.
Thanks. Just ordered a couple.
But how did you get them for $5.99?
There was a 3 week delivery time when I ordered them @ $5.99. They raised the price when they became immediately available. I’m still waiting for delivery.