Nos conseils aux professionnels - Nos astuces pour conserver une bouteille de vin ouverte - Les Grappes

Our tips for keeping an open bottle of wine

Updated November 29, 2022

This article is mainly aimed at restaurant owners who offer wine by the glass. With this practice you open bottles without finishing them, which can cause you losses. Don't panic, by following our advice, you can expect to keep your wine up to 5 days after opening. Even better, our selection of professional tools will ensure that you can maintain the quality of your wine for up to several weeks.

Here are our tips for storing opened wines. They can also be applied at home, when a bottle is not finished.

3 tips for good wine storage

If you offer wines in your bar or restaurant, you want to make the most of your product until the last drop, and this is normal. It would be a shame to waste a good wine by letting it air out...

Here are some techniques to preserve your wine efficiently after opening, and thus ensure its quality in the following days. They vary according to the type of wine. You will have to adapt yourself according to the properties of the opened wine. For example, somewhite winesare very sweet, such asSauternes These wines can be kept longer than others because the sugar helps to preserve an opened white wine.

The quality and conservation of an open wine depends essentially onthe temperatureThe quality and conservation of an open wine depends essentially on the temperature, the light and the quantity of oxygen present in the bottle. These are the elements that can alter your wine.

Put your bottle in the refrigerator

Be sure to keep your bottles away from high temperatures that accelerate the oxidation process. Avoid any proximity with heat sources: the ideal is not to exceed 15°C.

For white wine, we recommend the cellar or the refrigerator. Professionals advise to keep thered wineopen in the fridge for up to 5 days depending on the wine, and to take it out a few hours before serving so that it is at the right temperature.

Keep bottles away from light sources

Red wine does not like light. Avoid storing your opened bottle in a room with too much daylight or in the sun. Ideally, it should be stored in a closet or in a case.

Close the bottle immediately after serving

Finally, you must limit the oxidation of the wine: the air that comes into contact with the wine creates a chemical reaction, and your wine gradually loses its balance and becomes stale.

It is therefore imperative to remember to close the bottle immediately after serving. It is traditionally recommended to put the original cork back on. You can also transfer the wine into a smaller bottle: the fuller the bottle, the less the wine will spoil.

The best storage tools from the pros

If you want to keep an open bottle of wine for several weeks, we advise you to use a professional system, specially created for the conservation of open bottles of wine or for wine by the glass dispensers. The quality of your wine will be preserved for several weeks. We have selected for you the best conservation tools.

Presorvac

Presorvac is distinguished by its efficiency. It is a simple system that allows to remove the oxygen contained in the bottle by means of a rotating pressure. This process will prevent oxidation, and thus ensure a better conservation of the wine.

This system works for white, red and sparkling wines. Its high cost (about 350 euros) is quickly compensated by its efficiency.

Vacuvin

This system is composed of a small pump and a rubber stopper that pumps the air out of the bottle and preserves the wine for two to three days.

Vacuvin can be considered tedious as it can take up to 30 seconds to pump out the bottles. It is a careful operation as the rubber valve must not be broken by excessive pumping.

This tool is quite simple and accessible (count about 15 euros), and pays for itself quite quickly. It is intended for short term conservation, for modest bottles that do not require conservation over several months.

The Advineo Tower

This tool allows you to recork the opened bottles to better preserve them. It is a conservation by vacuum, thus natural and which avoids the oxidation of the wine remaining in the bottle. This system is intended for red, white and sparkling wines!

For the particular case of sparkling wines, CO2 is injected into the bottle before closing it.

Nitrogen systems

These systems allow the conservation of opened bottles for two to three weeks. At each bottling, the wine is replaced by food-grade nitrogen. The latter prevents the remaining wine from being oxidized. Nitrogen systems also have the advantage of regulating the temperature of the wine.

Nitrogen systems are mostly used in restaurants that offer high quality, expensive wines and therefore are not in demand. Such preservation tools are relatively expensive, since their maintenance must also be taken into account. Therefore, they are efficient systems, but they are intended for high quality products.

Coravin

This tool appeared recently in the United States and offers an original solution to the problem of preserving open wines. In order not to have to reseal the bottle after opening, Coravin proposes... not to open it. A hollow needle pierces the cork to extract the wine, a bit like a syringe. During the extraction, the needle injects a neutral gas.

This process makes it possible to extract wine for several months without it being altered. This original system is quite expensive since it is necessary to count approximately 300 euros for the syringe, without forgetting the price of the gas cartridges. This technique is interesting for great wines and beautiful labels, but not very profitable for less prestigious wines.

The revolution in wine distribution

Other methods get around the issue of preserving opened bottles of wine by eliminating the bottle. It is a question of proposing a wine dispenser or another system of conservation and presentation of the product.

Bag in box

This system revolutionizes the service of wine, since the bottle is replaced by a "bag-in-box". In other words, a cubicle is used to hold the wine. This system is mostly used by restaurants for serving pitchers of wine. The tradition of serving wine by the glass is still linked to serving it by the bottle.

Advineo

This is a wine by the glass dispenser. The idea is original and allows the service of wine by the glass while promising an optimal conservation of the wine in the bottle. This system allows to keep the wine up to 3 weeks under neutral gas (nitrogen and argon), and to maintain the wine at the right temperature for serving.

One of the positive points of this system is its presentation, its aesthetic. Design, the wine dispenser can be placed on the counter, to present the wines to the customers.

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