| Drink your wine before its decline | | Print | |
| Thursday, 29 September 2011 | |
Why are there no 'best before' dates on bottles?A reader asks why wine labels don't show a "best before" date, like other perishable foods and drinks.Good question, especially as people who cellar wine sometimes find that when they open some bottles, they are either completely dead or well past their prime. I swear that for some people, wine cellaring is an extreme sport, as they delay and delay opening a bottle, knowing all the time that the chances are increasing that the wine will be spoiled (and their money wasted). Those are vins de garde, of course, wines made for longer-term aging that are often undrinkable in the first few years. They need time for the components (like fruit, acid, tannins) to integrate and achieve a level of harmony. The trick is to drink them while they're at their best (a plateau that can last for years), but before they go into decline. If you're not sure, it's far better to drink a wine too early than too late. But these aren't the wines the reader was referring to. She meant the wines, mainly from the LCBO list and Vintages Essential collection, that I review here each week. When should they be consumed? The answer is fairly straightforward: drink them soon after you buy them. That doesn't mean you have to sprint home from the LCBO and guzzle the bottle within an hour. But there's no need to hang onto these wines for years. With a few exceptions, the wines in the LCBO are ready to drink when you buy them and will not improve with cellaring; they are as integrated and harmonious as they're going to get. You can keep many of them for a year or two or even three, and there are some that you could put away for five or more years. But the great majority won't taste any better after one or two or three years, so there's not much point in stockpiling them, except to save yourself frequent trips to the LCBO. But if some wines are best drunk within a year and others last three or more years, why not print a "best before" date on the label? Probably because no producer would want to be limited by a date. Wines last longer or shorter times according to the conditions they're kept in. Some go off earlier than you'd expect, others last much longer (I once found a two-year-old bottle of Beaujolais Nouveau that tasted just fine - and everyone says Beaujolais Nouveau should be drunk by the end of the vintage year, so this was well over the mark). The fact is that it's very difficult to estimate the time before a wine reaches its prime or starts its decline, and I don't think anyone would want to suggest you throw a wine out after a certain date, when it might be perfectly good. SKN Cabernet Sauvignon 2007 This dry and full-flavoured cabernet sauvignon is from California's Napa Valley. It has good acidity to balance the concentrated fruit flavours, and easygoing tannins. Drink it with red meats, grilled or roasted. 13.5-percent alcohol; $16.95 (218834) 35° South Cabernet Sauvignon-Merlot 2010 Made from organically grown grapes, this Argentine red has lots of sweet fruit flavour and a refreshingly tangy texture. It's dry, medium bodied, only lightly tannic, and it goes well with the full range of grilled red meats and sausages. 14-per-cent alcohol; $12.95 (218859) Henry of Pelham Pinot Grigio 2010 From one of Ontario's most reliable producers, this pinot grigio delivers flavours that are solid from start to finish, very good balance, and a fresh texture. Sip it on its own or drink it with seasoned grilled or roasted chicken. 12.5-per-cent alcohol; $14.95 (250217) STLTO Malbec-Merlot 2009 This is a well-priced, well-made, straightforward red blend from Italy. It has quite intense flavours, a tangy texture, and a good fruit-acid ratio. Dry and medium bodied, it works with red meats and hearty tomatobased pasta dishes. 13-per-cent alcohol; $11.95 (232272) |
|
| Last Updated ( Sunday, 02 October 2011 ) |