Hi,
I finally decanted my bottle of Dow's 1983. I was very careful but still had not just a piece or chunks of cork, but an explosion of pieces of all sizes that made their way into the decanter.
Thus, my first question:
I have been told that wine reacts to metal, thus when pouring one should avoid any contact with the metal foil. If this is true, is using a metal mesh/funnel ok when straining the port?
I did happen to try some of the port right away (I couldn't resist!). What I found was delicious flavors and a wonderful texture all a bit distracted by a burning sensation on the tongue and in my nose. Q2: Is this normal/reasonable or was the exploding cork a sign of sour grapes?
Thank you!
Oh the burn!
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cokenchips
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- Location: New York, NY
Oh the burn!
Richard New York, NY
Richard,
I can put your mind at rest. It sounds like your port is behaving quite normally.
Port wine - if fact, any wine - will react with metal when it is contact with the metal for a long time. Jay is a much more qualified chemist than I am (my chemistry was a long time ago) but I presume that it is the acidity in the wine that attacks the metal and generates the reaction. Some metals are much more prone to the acidic attack and can transfer undesirable flavours into a wine more quickly than others. I assume that this is the case with the old style lead/zinc capsules and hence the tradition that you remove the capsule completely when opening an old bottle of wine.
However, the nickel-steel or silver that most decanting funnels are made from will not react significantly with the wine as you pour it through the funnel, it just isn't in contact for long enough. Your wine is safe.
The burning sensation you experienced when you first tried the port is quite normal. If you read the tasting notes that people post you will see that its often commented how much a wine changes over time. Tom is especially good at posting notes from different times in a port's evolution in the decanter. You will often find that a wine smells and tastes very alcoholic when first decanted but 2-8 hours later (depending on the wine involved) you will find that the "burn" has gone and you have a lovely wine with fruit and texture and some very enjoyable complexity.
The wine will continue to evolve in the decanter and will still be very enjoyable for up to 2-3 days, maybe as much as 5 days if its a very young wine, but then the burn will start to come back and the wine will deteriorate and be less enjoyable. What did you think of your Dow '83 a few hours after your first sip?
And my last question for you is on the way you decanted the port. From what you have said, I suspect that you emptied the bottle carefully through the decanting funnel. While this works for some people on this forum (who fill their funnel full of clean cheesecloth to filter out the particles), this is not a technique that I can use successfully. Did you try this method? If so, the alternative that you can try is the one that I use almost all of the time. I stand the bottle upright for 2-3 days before I open it to let the sediment settle to the bottom of the bottle. I then remove the capsule and cork as carefully as I can without moving the bottle - I keep the bottle perfectly still on the worksurface and move myself around the bottle. Once the cork is out I will pour the wine through a funnel into a decanter until I see the sediment reaching the neck of the bottle (I usually shine a maglite torch through the bottle as I pour so that I can see the sediment moving). At this point I do not move the bottle from its position but use my left hand to repace the decanter with a clean and empty glass, the rest of the contents of the bottle then go into the empty glass. This way, I have a decanter full of clean and sediment-free port and a glass full of sediment but with a little bit of port that can be carefully sipped off the sediment if I'm desperate.
And if your decanter has more sediment in it than you would like, you can always redecant it, it will do the wine no harm at all.
Alex
I can put your mind at rest. It sounds like your port is behaving quite normally.
Port wine - if fact, any wine - will react with metal when it is contact with the metal for a long time. Jay is a much more qualified chemist than I am (my chemistry was a long time ago) but I presume that it is the acidity in the wine that attacks the metal and generates the reaction. Some metals are much more prone to the acidic attack and can transfer undesirable flavours into a wine more quickly than others. I assume that this is the case with the old style lead/zinc capsules and hence the tradition that you remove the capsule completely when opening an old bottle of wine.
However, the nickel-steel or silver that most decanting funnels are made from will not react significantly with the wine as you pour it through the funnel, it just isn't in contact for long enough. Your wine is safe.
The burning sensation you experienced when you first tried the port is quite normal. If you read the tasting notes that people post you will see that its often commented how much a wine changes over time. Tom is especially good at posting notes from different times in a port's evolution in the decanter. You will often find that a wine smells and tastes very alcoholic when first decanted but 2-8 hours later (depending on the wine involved) you will find that the "burn" has gone and you have a lovely wine with fruit and texture and some very enjoyable complexity.
The wine will continue to evolve in the decanter and will still be very enjoyable for up to 2-3 days, maybe as much as 5 days if its a very young wine, but then the burn will start to come back and the wine will deteriorate and be less enjoyable. What did you think of your Dow '83 a few hours after your first sip?
And my last question for you is on the way you decanted the port. From what you have said, I suspect that you emptied the bottle carefully through the decanting funnel. While this works for some people on this forum (who fill their funnel full of clean cheesecloth to filter out the particles), this is not a technique that I can use successfully. Did you try this method? If so, the alternative that you can try is the one that I use almost all of the time. I stand the bottle upright for 2-3 days before I open it to let the sediment settle to the bottom of the bottle. I then remove the capsule and cork as carefully as I can without moving the bottle - I keep the bottle perfectly still on the worksurface and move myself around the bottle. Once the cork is out I will pour the wine through a funnel into a decanter until I see the sediment reaching the neck of the bottle (I usually shine a maglite torch through the bottle as I pour so that I can see the sediment moving). At this point I do not move the bottle from its position but use my left hand to repace the decanter with a clean and empty glass, the rest of the contents of the bottle then go into the empty glass. This way, I have a decanter full of clean and sediment-free port and a glass full of sediment but with a little bit of port that can be carefully sipped off the sediment if I'm desperate.
And if your decanter has more sediment in it than you would like, you can always redecant it, it will do the wine no harm at all.
Alex
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Tom Archer
- Posts: 2790
- Joined: Tue Aug 09, 2005 8:09 pm
- Location: Near Saffron Walden, England
Good post Alex - one little detail though..
..take the foil off and clean the top of the bottle - THEN stand it up for a day or three - much easier than cautiously fiddling around when you want to decant it - particularly if it's an old bottle with a hard wax seal, or one of those bottles from the sixties that had thick plastic capsules..
Just my
!
Tom
..take the foil off and clean the top of the bottle - THEN stand it up for a day or three - much easier than cautiously fiddling around when you want to decant it - particularly if it's an old bottle with a hard wax seal, or one of those bottles from the sixties that had thick plastic capsules..
Just my
!Tom
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cokenchips
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- Joined: Thu Nov 02, 2006 7:05 am
- Location: New York, NY
Hi Bridgema (Alex),
Thank you for the information and encouragement! I think without the support and knowledge found on the site and the forum, I probably would have been turned off by my very initial experience with the '83 vintage port. It's actually my first glass of vintage port that I've had since a perfect glass of Quinto do Noval ordered for me at a restaurant a couple of years ago. I spent no time buying the bottle of Dow's '83, but I kept on waiting for that "special occasion," which turned out to be the frequent holiday called Thursday.
After reading your note, I poured myself a glass of the port and found it to hold a familiar but markedly different experience. The burn was still present, but much less of a factor, giving way to the dark cherry, and other flavors I'm still learning to discern.
As for my decanting methods, I actually just went free-hand. I decanted, waited for the wine to settle, and then recanted (does that word work in the context?) into the bottle, waited for it to settle and went back and forth from the decanter and bottle (cleaning each emptied vessel) until I decanted into the decanter a final time, pouring the last glass or so into a wine glass. It was a bit labor intensive, but I was happy with the results. If I find a funnel with a filter, I'll give it a try next time. Thanks for the other tips on the steps leading to, which I'll also make use of.
Now... back to the port...
-Richard
Thank you for the information and encouragement! I think without the support and knowledge found on the site and the forum, I probably would have been turned off by my very initial experience with the '83 vintage port. It's actually my first glass of vintage port that I've had since a perfect glass of Quinto do Noval ordered for me at a restaurant a couple of years ago. I spent no time buying the bottle of Dow's '83, but I kept on waiting for that "special occasion," which turned out to be the frequent holiday called Thursday.
After reading your note, I poured myself a glass of the port and found it to hold a familiar but markedly different experience. The burn was still present, but much less of a factor, giving way to the dark cherry, and other flavors I'm still learning to discern.
As for my decanting methods, I actually just went free-hand. I decanted, waited for the wine to settle, and then recanted (does that word work in the context?) into the bottle, waited for it to settle and went back and forth from the decanter and bottle (cleaning each emptied vessel) until I decanted into the decanter a final time, pouring the last glass or so into a wine glass. It was a bit labor intensive, but I was happy with the results. If I find a funnel with a filter, I'll give it a try next time. Thanks for the other tips on the steps leading to, which I'll also make use of.
Now... back to the port...
-Richard
Richard New York, NY
Tom,
For 20+ years I have been standing my bottles up for 2-3 days before opening them, and then on the day of opening I have very carefully removed the capsule and cork, cleaned up the bottle and decanted - accepting that with a wax capsule or similar I will just end up with a bit of sediment stirred up in the bottle.
And then you go and drop a bombshell like this on me! Why couldn't someone have suggested this to me 20 years ago! All that cloudy port I've had to endure!
:wall:
Just goes to show the best suggestions are the simplest. Thanks for the tip.
Alex
For 20+ years I have been standing my bottles up for 2-3 days before opening them, and then on the day of opening I have very carefully removed the capsule and cork, cleaned up the bottle and decanted - accepting that with a wax capsule or similar I will just end up with a bit of sediment stirred up in the bottle.
And then you go and drop a bombshell like this on me! Why couldn't someone have suggested this to me 20 years ago! All that cloudy port I've had to endure!
:wall:
Just goes to show the best suggestions are the simplest. Thanks for the tip.
Alex
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Tom Archer
- Posts: 2790
- Joined: Tue Aug 09, 2005 8:09 pm
- Location: Near Saffron Walden, England
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Derek T.
- Posts: 4080
- Joined: Wed Sep 14, 2005 5:02 pm
- Location: Chesterfield, United Kingdom - UK
- Contact:
bridgema wrote:Tom,
For 20+ years I have been standing my bottles up for 2-3 days before opening them, and then on the day of opening I have very carefully removed the capsule and cork, cleaned up the bottle and decanted - accepting that with a wax capsule or similar I will just end up with a bit of sediment stirred up in the bottle.
And then you go and drop a bombshell like this on me! Why couldn't someone have suggested this to me 20 years ago! All that cloudy port I've had to endure!
:wall:
Just goes to show the best suggestions are the simplest. Thanks for the tip.
Alex
I think this proves that you can teach an old dog a new trick
Derek