Opening wine to let it "breathe"

[Paul_Bruck]

I open all wines well in advance (if possible).
Usually I decant, sometimes not. I depends on my experience and feel -

I recommend that everybody make their own experiences - there will never be any agreement here

[RichardFlack]

Just wondering…. A bottle removed from cellar and opened at room temperature is warming up a good 15 degrees (ok 5-10 in the UK lol). There must be some slow circulation of the wine on top of Brownian motion. So that quarter sized air/wine boundary is probably far from static. Any one notice a difference between slow ox on bottles just pulled vs bottles stood up in the kitchen for a couple of days.

[MChang]

I open the wines and keep them in the cellar until they’re ready to be served, not sure what most people do.

[MChang]

@R_Frankel

@LasseK Well, yes. And, no.

I firmly believe that breathing/slow-ox does nothing for wines. By that I mean the mere removal of the cork, and letting the bottle sit open for a few hours.

Letting the bottle sit open for longer likely would have an effect. I don’t know what the ‘effect curve’ looks like, but certainly depends on the wine itself, temperature and humidity of the room it’s in, and possibly other things. So is the limit of tasting such an effect a day? A week? A month? But, really, nobody is suggesting opening bottles and leaving them around for very long periods of time (well, except for me in jest).

Of course one could conduct the experiment - open a bunch of bottles from a case and taste them at 1 day, 1 week, 1 month. But would this be data, or anecdote? Ok, then repeat the experiment with a 100 different wines, and a panel of tasters? Not with my cellar!

Or we could just argue about what we might actually do - slow ox for a few hours.

Have you tried blinding slow ox? You may be surprised what you’d find. Of course you would want to slow ox bottles that actually need it.

[R_Frankel]

If I think the bottle needs it, I open and double decant. How long before pouring depends on the bottle.

[MChang]

@R_Frankel

If I think the bottle needs it, I open and double decant. How long before pouring depends on the bottle.

Do you decant burgundy?

[Chris_Seiber]

So here are two more practical sub-questions.

(1) Which introduces more air and speeds up the aeration and eventual decline of a wine more: (a) drinking half a 750 over several hours, then recorking the bottle to revisit in a day or two, or (b) immediately after opening the 750, funneling half into a 375 or other smaller bottle to be completely full and sealing, then opening the small bottle in a day or two?

I’ve always believed (a) (and thus I do technique (b) if I want to reduce/slow the oxygenation); however others claim that the micro aeration from funneling the first half into a small bottle oxygenates the second half more than the pouring of the night one glasses plus the exposed surface area in the half full bottle.

(2) If you do a quick double decant (pour the whole bottle into a decanter, then funnel back into the bottle full or almost full), how much does it matter how close to serving time you do that? Is right before you leave for the restaurant / tasting significantly different than a few hours earlier, or lunchtime, or the morning?

I guess the issue is you’ve introduced micro-oxygenation with the two pours, and now those are acting on the wine even as it’s back full in a bottle and recorked. But how rapid is that process now, and thus, how important are differences of a few hours in how far ahead you do it?

Those questions don’t have clear black and white answers, but I’m curious for people’s experiences.

[MChang]

@Chris_Seiber

So here are two more practical sub-questions.

(1) Which introduces more air and speeds up the aeration and eventual decline of a wine more: (a) drinking half a 750 over several hours, then recorking the bottle to revisit in a day or two, or (b) immediately after opening the 750, funneling half into a 375 or other smaller bottle to be completely full and sealing, then opening the small bottle in a day or two?

I’ve always believed (b); however others claim that the micro aeration from funneling the first half into a small bottle oxygenates the second half more than the pouring of the night one glasses plus the exposed surface area in the half full bottle.

(2) If you do a quick double decant (pour the whole bottle into a decanter, then funnel back into the bottle full or almost full), how much does it matter how close to serving time you do that? Is right before you leave for the restaurant / tasting significantly different than a few hours earlier, or lunchtime, or the morning?

I guess the issue is you’ve introduced micro-oxygenation with the two pours, and now those are acting on the wine even as it’s back full in a bottle and recorked. But how rapid is that process now, and thus, how important are differences of a few hours in how far ahead you do it?

Those questions don’t have clear black and white answers, but I’m curious for people’s experiences.

For part 1, i think a) introduces more air.

I think for your second question it absolutely makes a difference how early you double decant.

[Chris_Seiber]

@MChang

I think for your second question it absolutely makes a difference how early you double decant.

Thanks for your replies.

Let’s tease this out, realizing we are just spitballing and this is all far from scientific: if you have some Bordeaux you would have poured into a wide glass decanter two hours before serving it, but you are instead doing the immediate double decant (because you’re transporting it, or to go into a blind bag, or for whatever other reason), would you guess a similar amount of time, i.e. two hours? Would you do it less far in advance because the wine gets poured back and forth a second time? Would you do it more far in advance because once it’s back in the bottle it doesn’t have all the surface exposure?

[Alan_Rath]

@MChang

Have you tried blinding slow ox? You may be surprised what you’d find. Of course you would want to slow ox bottles that actually need it.

You can’t blind slow ox, as soon as you pour, the wine experiences much more than it could ever experience being “slow ox’d”.

Slow ox is the homeopathy of wine aeration.

[Andrew_K]

My experience with opening, pouring off a half glass and recorking Champagne, is it definitely has an effect, but it doesn’t work very quickly. Hours are needed to really see a difference. Depending on how tight the bottle is, 3 hours min, but up to 6 hours is needed to see measurable results. But that also means it’s forgiving if you open it a bit too early. It’s not like it introduces so much air that it is going to cause a more open bottle to fall off a cliff. I think it works the same way with the Audouze or slow-ox method on a Burg. It’s not going to really aerate the bottle just sitting there open, so it’s very forgiving. But at the same time, there’s no doubt that it does have an effect, contrary to those “science-heads” that say that a=b and b=c, blah, blah, so there’s no effect.

[Mark_Y]

@MChang

Idk i think you’d recognize most of the names at the events. Pretty good cross section of the top burg drinkers on here.

Was @CFu at any of those? I’m told he doesn’t believe in slow ox

[MChang]

@Alan_Rath

@MChang

Have you tried blinding slow ox? You may be surprised what you’d find. Of course you would want to slow ox bottles that actually need it.

You can’t blind slow ox, as soon as you pour, the wine experiences much more than it could ever experience being “slow ox’d”.

Slow ox is the homeopathy of wine aeration.

Yes you can blind slow ox.

Open a bottle, put it in the cellar. Wait 2 hours or however long you want to wait, take an identical bottle, wrap both in foil. Open bottle 2. Bring both bottles, and pour 2 glasses. Taste.

[MChang]

@Chris_Seiber

@MChang

I think for your second question it absolutely makes a difference how early you double decant.

Thanks for your replies.

Let’s tease this out, realizing we are just spitballing and this is all far from scientific: if you have some Bordeaux you would have poured into a wide glass decanter two hours before serving it, but you are instead doing the immediate double decant (because you’re transporting it, or to go into a blind bag, or for whatever other reason), would you guess a similar amount of time, i.e. two hours? Would you do it less far in advance because the wine gets poured back and forth a second time? Would you do it more far in advance because once it’s back in the bottle it doesn’t have all the surface exposure?

I think you’d double decant earlier than if your poured it into a decanter.

[MChang]

@Mark_Y

@MChang

Idk i think you’d recognize most of the names at the events. Pretty good cross section of the top burg drinkers on here.

Was @CFu at any of those? I’m told he doesn’t believe in slow ox

I think the events we went to with Cfu we mostly decanted the wines; I don’t remember how the mgs were handled at anajak.

[Andrew_K]

@Alan_Rath

Slow ox is the homeopathy of wine aeration.

Great analogy considering some homeopathy actually has an effect, just like slow-ox.

But you can keep living in your black and white world!

[Paul_Jaouen]

I was a non-believer and I still think it does nothing for young wines. But after trying it countless times on older wines I am now a believer. it works amazingly well for those 40 to 60 year old Piedmontese and Rioja wines that I open.

[Alan_Rath]

@Andrew_K

@Alan_Rath

Slow ox is the homeopathy of wine aeration.

Great analogy considering some homeopathy actually has an effect, just like slow-ox.

But you can keep living in your black and white world!

Yeah, black and white is definitely a lot less interesting than imaginary

[MChang]

@Paul_Jaouen

I was a non-believer and I still think it does nothing for young wines. But after trying it countless times on older wines I am now a believer. it works amazingly well for those 40 to 60 year old Piedmontese and Rioja wines that I open.

It only works for young wines that need time.

[Alan_Rath]

@MChang

@Paul_Jaouen

I was a non-believer and I still think it does nothing for young wines. But after trying it countless times on older wines I am now a believer. it works amazingly well for those 40 to 60 year old Piedmontese and Rioja wines that I open.

It only works for young wines that need time.

Perfect!

It only works for very old wines.

It only works for very young wines.