Cecil’s recent discourse on maturity vs. age in spirits and the corresponding “Maturity” thread almost, but not quite, resolve a dispute between me and my brother. I would appreciate expert testimony that develops the information presented so far.
My brother recently expressed horror and outrage upon hearing that my niece and I had dumped the contents of my late mother’s meager “liquor cabinet” in the course of cleaning out her house. I don’t drink much, and my niece’s college imbibing is more that of the talented amateur than the conoisseur.
The liquor consisted mostly of opened bottles of run-of-the-mill brands like Canadian Club whiskey, Christian Brothers brandy, Frangelico, etc. There was no way to determine how old the items were, or when they were opened. I’d guess that they were all at least five years old or more.
My brother contended-- wrongly, I now know-- that hard liquor only improves with age, regardless of whether it’s been opened. But I’m wondering whether the opposite is true, i.e. whether the stuff has a finite shelf life. I would think that over time, alcohol would evaporate, and/or some sort of deterioration or negative process would “ruin” the liquor. Regardless of whether it matures or improves on the shelf, does bottled liquor indeed keep indefinitely?
I would appreciate a chance to rub my brother’s face in his self-righteous ignorance.
PS: I trust it’s OK to post the same inquiry in more than one thread. I really want some feedback on this!
Medium-alcohol high-sugar will keep fairly well, the sugar acting as a preservative.
A bottle of Baileys, however, is about as durable as a pot of cream.
Once any alcohol is bottled, the ‘maturing’ process is finished. An 8-year malt produced in 1960 is the same as an 8-year malt off the shelf today. All that differs is the subsequent time in the bottle, after eight maturing years in a barrel. Wine afficianados will claim otherwise - let them argue their own case
I have evidence that doesn’t even take an expert nose to appreciate. Look at a new sauternes wine and see the pale color, similar to many other white wines. Then look at one of my 1974 Suduirauts and see the dark orange color. It’s plain to see that something has changed.
IANAO, but I think it has to do with the alcohol concentration. Beer “skunks”, wine ages in the bottle, but ports, sherries, brandies, and spirits remain essentially unchanged as time goes by, IIRC.
The summer of '74 had a unique rainfall/sunshine pattern, as does every summer. Different vintage wines are different, but not beacuse they’ve been sat in the bottle longer, but because they were made from different grapes.
I suggested a new bottle as it’s impossible for you to go back and view this bottle when it was new. I have seen the color change over time. Try buying a new bottle and hold onto it for thirty years to see for YODS.
Wine changes, and good wine generally improves. Ports, in contrast to what you’ve said, most assuredly change over time - vintage ports, especially from good vintages, aren’t ready until ten, fifteen, sometimes twenty years in the bottle. The taste is very much affected by sitting; younger wines are brasher, fruitier, more upfront; they become more subtle with age. (I personally lean towards more immature ports, but your tastes may be different.) Some varieties change color quite definitely over time; I think tawny ports in particular are known for that, but I can’t recall whether they lighten or darken.
Wine ages, though - due to its own chemical content, slight exposure to oxygen and evaporation of water, et cetera. I don’t know whether spirits age or not - does that mean twenty year old scotch has been in a barrel for the last twenty years?
I tend to know more about “real” wines than ports, sherries, madeiras, etc. I was inder the impression that port had brandy added to halt the chemical changes. Was that another kind that I’m confounding with port, or was it that the brandy only halts fermentation?
I know sherry is fortified by the system of mixing the barrels, though.
A bad wine will become worse with time! Some wines, like Beujolais nouveau must be consumed a few months after bottling.
Good wines, with a high tannin content, improve somewhat with age. The tannin present in the young wine is degraded in more palatable substances. The aromas, initially fruited or flowery get other nuances (honey, leather,…) forming what we call bouquet. Only old wines have bouquet!
But even a great wine will finally die. The several substances that compose it will deteriorate and as the cork becomes dry, bacteria will enter the bottle and transform the alcool into vinegar.
Liquors don’t pass by the chemical reactions the wine does, and the high alcool content kills the acidifying bacteria. So, unless the alcool evaporates, the liquor should become inaltered for decades.
About port, it is true that alcool is added to the wine, before all the sugar is converted into alcool. The fungi responsible by the fermentation die because of the high alcool content. That is why port and madeira are sweet.
Yes, yes. Not all wines are improved with aging. Did I ever make that claim?
Only red wines have tannins, so are you claiming all white wines are “bad”? Further, the “bouquet” of a wine is just a fancy word for its smell. All wines have a bouquet, but the bouquets of some wines (aged “big Bordeaux”, for instance) are significantly more complex than those of others.
I’m pretty sure that even a hermetically sealed wine will eventually becomes vinegar. There are chemical processes going on whether or not the cork dries.
Most white wines don’t age very well. One of the reasons is that they have a low tannin content. A good young Chardonnay has some tannin and will age well.
Bouquet is not synonimous of smell! Wines have three tipes of aromas. The primary ones originate with the fruit. They are dependent of the tipe of grape, the soil, the sun…
The secondary aromas originate in the fermentation process. During fermentation, several substances in the wine are transformed in aromatic ones.
The terciary aromas originate by aging. These are in general animal aromas like honey and leather, that I cited before.
The three aromas together form the bouquet. So only aged wines have it. Younger wines have only primary and secondary aromas.
I’ve never known a white to be described as having any appreciable level of tannin, and it seems from a quick search that most that is present is effectively leached from the oak casks.
A quick web search finds people coming down on either side, usually with a comment that there is no consensus. I’d like to see a definitive cite from someone with at least an M.S. in V&E before I fully concede the point.
As a practical matter, almost all the tastings I’ve been to have used the terms “bouquet” and “aroma” nearly interchangably. I think whatever distinction there is amounts, in a general audience, to an attempt at elitism. So many people are intimidated away from an appreciation of wine that it would behoove afficionados to allow some leeway in the name of comprehensibility. The whole “aroma before, bouquet after” smacks a bit of the philosophers’ bled emeroses anyhow.
I assume by “real” you mean unfortified, correct? The fortification stops the fermentation, but that’s not the only chemical process wine undergoes. After all, bottled wine is generally safe from fermentation no matter what, but any wine will change with the years.
Port, sherry, and madeira are wonderful drinks, though (the good ones at any rate) even if port and sherry in particular have old mannish images associated with them. They’re not second-rate by any means - if they were, they wouldn’t fetch nearly the price they can. A 1994 vintage port (1994 being a famously good year for ports) from a good winery will fetch a couple hundred bucks today, and down the road, when they’re ready for drinking, they’ll cost much more.
Tannin comes mainly from the peel and the stems. White wines made from red grapes clearly lack tannin, since the peels are removed before fermentation in order to not furnish pigments to the wine. White wines made from white grapes may have the peels maintained in the early stages of fermentation, in order to acquire body.
I have no university degree in V&E, but I am a member of the Brazilian Association of Sommeliers. I can not claim to be an expert in wines, but I surely am constantly in contact with experts. Perhaps in the USA experts use bouquet for aroma, but I assure you that at least in France, Italy and Brazil the difference is as I stated.
Of course, unsofisticated wine lovers could use bouquet for aroma in those countries.
I didn’t mean any offense by my choice of terms. The word “unfortified” failed to come to mind. I would say that there’s something fundamentally different done to each kind of fortified wine than is done to unfortified wines, and I tend to think of each of them as being a distinct class of drink. I also didn’t recall (as I mentioned) whether or not the port method only brought fermentation to a premature halt (leaving more sugar), or whether other chemical processes were cut off as well.
This is not to say I don’t enjoy them, mind you. I just know less about them than I do about unfortified wines. For those details on which I was unclear regarding fortified wines, I offer my mea culpa.
