How to store and preserve your wines.

Ideally bottles of wine should be placed horizontally in a dark cellar with a constant temperature of 10-12 degrees Celsius and 60-70% humidity, in absence of vibrations. In fact rise or fall of temperature, especially change in temperature between seasons, may ruin the wine as can light, which favours oxidative phenomenon. An excess or lack of humidity may ruin the cork and vibrations can cause problems as well. Wine is a live substance, which evolves in time, but in order to evolve properly it needs optimal conditions. You might not believe it, but a bottle of white wine, which is conserved properly, may last more than ten years, whereas the same bottle, which isn’t conserved properly must be thrown away after only a few months! Unfortunately, not all houses nowadays are equipped with a cellar with these characteristics, in order to have one, it should be various meters underground, whereas modern storage rooms are found on surface or at high levels. I tried to measure the difference in temperature between summer and winter in a basement in Milan in a modern building. The thermometer read 26°C in summer and 7°C in winter! So what to do? Even if one doesn’t have the right cellar there are various solutions to be found. The best solution is to buy an air-conditioned cabinet for conserving wine. They’re available both on the national and international market and they can be placed anywhere (just as long as there’s an electrical source ... and they don’t ruin the design of the house). On the other hand, the negative aspect is that they’re very expensive. If your need requires that you conserve wine for only a few months then we don’t recommend you buy this product. If on the other hand, you’re used to conserving several bottles of wine, more than you consume, for several years, perhaps precious bottles, then it’s worth the investment. Are you the kind of person who buys only a few bottles a month and you consume them immediately? At least try to avoid conserving them in the kitchen or refrigerator. When in the refrigerator, the wine absorbs food odours, which pass through the cork. Electrical light source or sun ruins the bottles and the temperature may undergo sudden changes in very little time; for example when you open the window in winter or when the sun hits the windows in summer. In that case, it’s best to keep them in a garage in the dark (possibly far from your car exhaust) or in a storage room without any windows. One last bit of advice, once a bottle of wine is open, it is preferable to consume it immediately. When a bottle of white wine is opened and then placed in the refrigerator, it no longer has the same flavour. The same goes for red wine (with the rare exception of Barolo, one of the very few wines that maintains its characteristics even in a half full bottle ... but please only for a few days!)