“You get better with age like a fine wine…” ❤️
We’ve all heard sayings like this before that leave us to believe that all fine wine gets better with age. This is partly true – many fine wines do get better with some age – but which wines are meant for aging and how long they should be aged, is actually quite a complex topic. Then there are multiple factors that come into play regarding storage/cellar conditions that will either age wine well, or ruin it quickly.
A huge misconception I’ve come across in speaking with friends and family about wine is that it ALL gets better with age. This is definitely not true! There is a saying in the wine world that only 1% of wine is actually meant to be aged in the bottle, which means that 99% of the wine on the shelves right now is meant to be consumed within a few short years from now, or today! More on specific aging times in a moment. I’ll tell you right now, that 1% more than likely didn’t cost less than $20 either, so if you’re hanging on to those $7.99 bottles, it’s time to grab some glasses, or possibly make dinner with some type of a wine sauce!
Wine needs to have certain qualities to give it the ability to age well. Madeline Puckette, the creator of Wine Folly, gives 4 qualities that you can look for in a wine to determine if it is age worthy: Acidity, Tannins, Alcohol Level, and Residual Sugar. [1]
Acidity
The higher the acid in the wine, the better it will age. When tasting wine, acidity is the factor that makes your mouth water. It is often described as “crispness.” Chablis, for example, has a high amount of acidity, and can age well, even though it’s made from white grapes. (Tip your chin down with the wine in your mouth and see how much spit forms. If there’s a lot, it’s higher in acid!)
Tannins
Lots of red grapes have high tannins and can be aged for several years. Sometimes whites have tannins, but rarely. Tannins are chemical compounds that come from the seeds, skins and stems of grapes. When you taste them in wine, they’re not so much a flavour as a feeling. (That dry feeling you get along your gums, like when you drink a way over-steeped tea, is the feeling of tannins!) In the process of making red wine, the grape juice sits with these parts of the grape, allowing the tannins to enter the wine. Some can come from oak contact as well. Certain grapes are more tannic than others, depending on their composition, and certain wines will be more tannic if they’re left to sit with the skins, etc. for longer periods of time. These tannins can be bitter and harsh in young wines, but they help them age well because with time, the tannins “soften,” and become more “well-rounded.” This basically means that instead of the wine tasting sharp and pungent in your mouth, it will taste more smooth and balanced; higher tannin wines need age to taste better.
Alcohol Level and Residual Sugar
Red wines with higher alcohol content, closer to the 14% mark, will typically age better than lower alcohol reds. Whites have lower alcohol in them, but some grapes have particular compounds and sugar levels that will allow for a decent amount of residual, that is, left-over sugar, once the fermentation process is done. These whites, like Rieslings, for example, have a balance of sugar and acid that enables them to age well.
So now that you’ve determined you’ve got a wine you’re going to hold on to, here are some things to think about before you put it away and forget about it.
Screwcap vs. Synthetic Cork vs. Real Cork
The method of capping wines is still a largely debated topic in the wine industry. Real cork, vs. synthetic cork, vs. screwcap – there are a lot of opinions out there on which is best and why. For more information on this topic, check out my article Real Cork vs. Synthetic Cork and Screwcaps. For the purposes of this article, I’ll only comment related to wine’s age-ability and storage.
Australia and New Zealand initiated the use of screw caps, and still use them on many of their wines. Other countries have started following suit. A screw cap does not indicate poor quality wine, it’s simply a method that some producers believe is the best way to seal their wines. Wines with screw caps don’t need to be laying down for storage, but they can be. Screw caps haven’t been tested for super long term aging, but some can last a decade or more.
Wine professionals have recommended to me, on more than one occasion, that synthetic cork should not be left in contact with the wine for long periods of time; they say it can leave a plastic type taste in the wine, and can also leave other synthesized compounds in the wine, that they don’t want to be consuming several years down the line. Stand those synthetic cork wines up for any length of storage. Fair enough. These are also only guaranteed for a few years at best.
Wine with a real cork must be stored lying down. Cork is a natural compound, and it dries out over time. By lying the wine on its side, the wine stays touching the bottom of the cork, and the moisture helps to keep the cork damp enough that it shouldn’t dry out. This is important, because if the cork dries out, it shrivels up and shrinks, letting too much unwanted air into the bottle. Over the years, the overdose of oxygen will ruin the wine, leaving it “oxidized” and undesirable. Natural cork has proven the test of time and has lasted sometimes for hundreds of years.
Cellar Conditions
Have you ever been to a winery, or seen photos of their cellars? What do you notice about them? They’re usually cool, dark, and damp, and the wine is off to the side and out of the way so it doesn’t have to be moved.
Cellar conditions for ideal wine storage should be between 10 and 15 degrees Celsius, and shouldn’t change much. Light shining onto the bottles for some time can alter the wine inside, whether it’s natural or artificial light. Humidity will help keep the corks damp, so they stay plump and tightly sealed to the inside of the bottle’s neck. The more you can leave the wine alone, without bumping it and moving it, the better its chances are of aging well.
When wine is resting well, it’s aging well, similar to you! Just think of how well you would rest if someone kept changing the temperature on you, shining light on you, and bumping you around – exactly. This is why I can’t sleep on an airplane. If you want your wine to be pleasant, give it a good rest!
Did you know that storing wine in a kitchen is actually one of the worst places in a home environment to keep it? The temperature fluctuates the most in kitchens/bathrooms out of any of the rooms in your home.
How Long is Too Long?
There is a window of time that most wine professionals believe wine is at its best. The window will vary slightly for each wine, but at a certain point, it will hit its peak, and begin to decline in quality again. There is no exact way to know when this is, so it can feel like a risk when you’ve been aging a wine for a while, and want to make sure it’s at its best before popping that old cork ever so gently!
So many great wines become collector’s items, and people spend so much money on them, that they never want to drink them. I once heard someone on a wine documentary say something to the effect of how many of the world’s greatest wines have essentially gone to waste, sitting in someone’s cellar for way too long, because people don’t understand how wine ages. There’s a time and place for cellaring wine, but in the end, wine is meant to be drunk.
Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine is one of my favourite wine books. She says, “contrary to popular opinion, only a small subgroup of wines benefit from extended bottle aging. The great bulk of wine sold today, red as well as white and pink, is designed to be drunk within a year, or at most two, of bottling.”[2]
In her expert opinion, she goes on to list specific numbers of years that several particular types of wine should be aged for, of which I’ve only included a few popular choices. Almost all whites retailing under the $20 range should only be bottle aged to a maximum of 2 years. Heavier whites, like Chardonnay can sometimes last up to 6 years. More expensive whites can age longer, like Chablis (up to 15 years), or some Rieslings (up to 20).[3] This has to do with the structure of the particular grapes, and how they’re produced.
Surprisingly, the number doesn’t differ much for reds. If they’re around that same $20 mark or under, the longest Jancis recommends you keep them is 3 years. You can hang onto higher priced French wines in your cellar from 15 to 25 years, Italian Chianti or Spanish Rioja can present nicely up to 10 and 20 respectively as well. Above the $20 price point, most Cabernet Sauvignons can be bottle aged for 7 – 17 years, Pinot Noirs, 4 – 10, Shiraz, 4 – 12, and Grenache, 3 – 8. [4] Jancis has not lead me astray yet, and I trust these numbers; keep in mind there are always exceptions, and your cellar conditions need to be appropriate, especially if you’re considering aging your own wines in the bottles.
*Note that keeping value wines up to that 2-3 year mark is NOT going to enhance their flavour; think of that time frame like a best before date.
To determine how long the wine has been in the bottle, you’re going to have to do some math! The year on the label is the year the grapes were harvested, not the year it was bottled necessarily, so if the label explains that it was aged in the winery for a certain number of years, you can add that time to the year on the label to get the bottling year.
If you’re looking to age a wine, remember to look for wines that are balanced in acidity, alcohol, residual sugar, or have some tannin to them. You’ll want to spend a bit more on these ones, and watch out for synthetic cork. If you’ve got a lot of $20 to $30 wines sitting in your house, it may be time to have a party! Let’s not let that wine go to waste. Happy aging of the appropriate ones, and cheers to all the rest of them!
[1] Puckette, Madeline. (2017, Feb.) “How to Tell If A Wine Is Age-Worthy.” Retrieved from https://winefolly.com/tutorial/how-to-tell-if-a-wine-is-age-worthy/
[2] Robinson, Jancis. The Oxford Companion to Wine. 2015. Oxford, UK; Oxford University Press.
[3] Robinson, Jancis. The Oxford Companion to Wine. 2015. Oxford, UK; Oxford University Press.
[4] Robinson, Jancis. The Oxford Companion to Wine. 2015. Oxford, UK; Oxford University Press.
Cherished Life by Chelsea 