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FRIDAY January 2, 2004 - Subscribe - Contact Us Valley&State Backpage O&E Sports Archives Classifieds Faith&Beliefs Obituaries Revels December 30, 2003 Off the Vine Slowing the death of wine Lorn Razzano It is Sunday night and we have just finished dinner. Before me is a half empty glass of wine. I see by my weather gauge that the temperature is dropping and the barometer has sunk like a used Chevy in a pond. The wind is picking up and gusts batter the house. I can see that my big cat, Frankie, is looking out the sliding glass door. He turns to me for reassurance as our barbecue grill decides to do the jitterbug across the redwood deck. Time to tie things down! When I get back to my glass of wine I am not surprised that the wine tastes different after the hour or so of nailing and super gluing the place shut. If there is one constant truth to wine it is that wine is born to die. The final resting place for wine resides in vinegar. How do we keep wine "alive" for a few days after it has been open to keep enjoying its pleasures? Here are a few well used tips: 1. There is a little device called a "Vacu Vin." This little device extracts a goodly amount of "air" from the bottle by the application of a rubber gasket and a pump. We know that bad little pathogens live in the air we breathe and can kill a bottle of wine in a couple of days. The theory of the "Vacu Vin" is to take enough of the air out to save the bottle of wine. I have never liked the pump much, I think it extracts way too much of the bouquet of the wine out of the bottle and leaves the wine "flat." At repeated tastings between a pumped wine and another of the same wine that was also left open without being pumped, there was a marked difference in the richness of the nose. All of us preferred the non pumped bottle. I'd rate the thing a 2 out of 10. 2. Private Preserve-This is a nifty can of spray which comes with a long plastic stem to shoot the spray into the bottle. The gasses in the can are heavier than air, argon and carbon dioxide. This system works on the principle that these heavy gasses cover the surface of the wine, not allowing the bad boys in the air to convert the wine to vinegar. I prefer this system as it does not strip the wine of its precious bouquet and actually allows the wine to sit for a few days without a radical change in tastes. It is not foolproof but rates a 5 out of 10. Both above systems cost about ten bucks. 3. The Romans came across an ingenious way to preserve wine. I actually used this way of wine preservation while working at a tiny family winery in northern Italy. In a larger scale it really works amazingly well and I found a way to do the same method at home. We actually preserved many 50-gallon units of wine in a stainless steel barrel by covering the top of the wine with olive oil before securing the lid! As you know, olive oil and vinegar separate in a cruet. This separation also occurs in wine and effectively seals the wine from the air. Not bad, eh? One simply pours from the bottom of the barrel into bottles and the oil drops with the level of the wine, never leaving its protective coating. I never tasted olive oil in the wine. For home application, use a sun-tea container with the spigot on the bottom. Put a few teaspoons on the surface of the wine you poured into the container (softly without airing the wine) and pour out the wine you need on a daily basis. The wine will last quite a while. When you start to get oil out of the spigot, add more wine! Just a couple of teaspoons does the job. Cost, minimal. 4. Cooling-freezing. That's right. Cooling the wine retards bacteriological growth. Freezing the wine (hey, it's only fruit) stops any movement quickly. Take your half full bottle, put in the cork and toss it in the deep freeze. Think ahead. Place the wine bottle on the sink, away from sunlight and heat, and let it thaw naturally. By dinner the wine should be well thawed and ready to drink. This method works well with a half full bottle before vacation. I've frozen wine for months and the tastes have rarely diminished. Putting the wine, red as well as white, in the fridge does very well for the wine for over a week. Pour an hour before dinner and place the red back into the cold box. These two methods work very well and cost is about zero. I've known wine judges to take home many half full bottles from judgings, throw them in the freezer and enjoy them for months. No kidding. Give some of these ideas a try. Hope you'ew having a great holiday season! Lorn Razzano has been a commercial wine and spirits judge at state fairs in California, Oregon and Washington and is a co-founder KSOR wine tasting. He was on winery staffs of various Italian and French wineries in the 1970s, and has owned Ashland Wine Cellar since 1980. DailyTidings.com Home Page Valley&State | Backpage | O&E | Sports | Archives | Weather | Classifieds Columnists | Faith&Beliefs | Obituaries | Revels | Subscribe | Contact Us Copyright 2003 Ashland Daily Tidings and Ottaway Newspapers All Rights Reserved Site Search: .:Advertisements:. RESOURCES - ODOT Road Cams