I have actually searched the internets for this, but as is often the case, conflicting opinions are rife and 90% of those are just guesswork. I’m also posting this in GQ because I’m after actual first hand experience and facts upon what ‘spoiling’ actually means when discussing wine.
Most information on wines refer to them spoiling in terms of taste, but how about in terms of the possibility of genuine food poisoning?
It’s not necessarily relevant to my current half bottle, but it’s something I often wonder whenever I leave some wine (not that often).
I have a half bottle of 10 day old red 2015 Merlot here… just had a sip… it tastes a little more ‘acidic’ than I remember, but there are no alarm bells going off in my head telling me it’s unsafe to drink. It tastes fine, just not particularly ‘tasty’.
I must point out, the average day/room temp over the last week has been 16-20 degrees centigrade.
This question is more for those people who have finished off bottles of unrefrigerated wine a week or 2 after opening - did you die? Ok, I’m being dramatic… were you ill?
It is fine. I seldom finish a bottle of wine at one sitting . I routinely drink the wine as much as a month later without ill effect. This assumes that it was recorked at least half heartedly.
Most hard alcohol can be kept at room temp after being opened for months (years??*). Wine can certainly stay fine, but horrible tasting for a couple of weeks at least. I seem to remember finding a leftover glass of red wine in the basement that had mold growing in it. Not sure if that would happen if it was still in the bottle or not.
I have several bottles in my liquor cabinet that have sat there, undisturbed, for years. They look just fine-normal color, no mold, etc, but I’m not sure how they taste.
Some red wines can even improve by being open a few days. I once had a mediocre Cabernet that I didn’t much care for, so I left the open bottle on the counter.
About a week later, I tried it. It was delicious. The wait aerated the wine and removed the harshness.
Wine goes bad (taste only, not harmful to consume) when it oxidizes when exposed to air. Putting it in the fridge doesn’t help much and since red wine tastes best at room temperature, is not a great idea. I never drink more than one glass of wine at a time. So, I buy the four pack of wine bottles that each hold 187 ml (6.3 oz) and keep the empty bottles. When I open a new regular size bottle of wine I fill three of these bottles to the top and drink the rest. The wine in the remaining three bottles remain good (at room temperature) for just as long as it would have in the original bottle.
There was a time when only cheap “wino” wine had screw-on caps, and for centuries only corks were used for good wines. However, over the last several years the tradition of corks has given way to the reality that modern screw caps actually seal better, and many good wines use them now.
“Spoiled” wine is a product that people pay good money for. It is called vinegar including very expensive balsamic vinegars. Wine itself is already spoiled in a way because it is fermented. Drinking an even more spoiled version is not going to hurt you.
It have seen people try wine that is hundreds of years old including some from shipwrecks. Most of it tastes like shit but it is perfectly fine to try.
At least in Australia and UK, corks have been consigned to history. There may be some wines that still have corks, but largely only as a high end novelty.
What causes wine to degrade once opened is oxidization, and I don’t think refrigeration makes any difference to that. Your best strategy is to reseal your wine, and it’s easier to do that with a screw top than with a cork. If you want to do more than that, you can buy a little gizmo that attempts to extract the air from the bottle, so that you reseal it in a (partial) vacuum. How much difference this makes I can’t say.
As Carlarm points out, it is the interaction of the wine with air that causes it to oxidize and become vinegar. Refrigeration has no effect one way or another.
If you want to keep your wine tasty over a few days, you need to create a vacuum in the bottle. There are inexpensive tools to do this: Wine Saver Kit
Generally works well.
The wines RealityChuck is referring to that improve with several days of aeration are usually pretty expensive. Most contemporary red wines are meant to be drunk within a day of opening unless they are preserved with a vacuum. Once in awhile, you hit a winner, though.
It depends on what your standards are. Wine taste starts to degrade right away and will be noticeable in a day or two for a connoisseur but, if it tastes fine to you, it is generally safe to drink. There are all kinds of fancy kits to replace the air to keep wine fresh but that sounds like a dumb idea to me. A standard bottle of wine is only a little over 4 glasses. Who buys one and thinks, “This is too much for me and my friends. We will just have to save this for a few days”?
The problem has already been solved in general. Box wine used to get a bad rap because of the quality but there are some high quality versions now. You can just put it on your counter or refrigerator and leave it as long as you want. They have an internal bag that collapses as you drink it so it won’t go bad in any reasonable amount of time.
There is is no reason to rely on ancient Roman levels of technology these days.
Not everyone has friends over every night and some of us live alone. I buy decent wine and no way am I going to throw away three-quarters of it after my nightly glass. It takes seconds to pump extra air out of the bottles I enjoy… for a cost of less than $10 invested in a wine saver vacuum – an “ancient Roman level of technology,” I guess, but one well worth it to me. And perhaps to others, too.
Agree re box wines… there are some good ones, I understand, and the bladder solves the oxidation problem. I just haven’t found any I prefer.
If wine tastes good to you it is a good wine. If it tastes great to you it is a great wine. There is no such thing as wine that is bad if it tastes OK, connoisseur or not.
There are really two components to wine going off. As noted above, oxidation is the prime one. Wine open to the air will start to oxidise. But wine is very complex beast, and the balance of components is what makes it taste great or not. Sometimes a bit of oxidisation is a good thing, as it drives the balance in a beneficial direction. Sometimes not. Eventually any wine will oxidise enough that it is only fit for the sink.
Then there is microbial action. Wine that is off straight out of a newly opened bottle has usually been subject to some form of microbial taint. Corked wine is the very characteristic taste left by fungal degradation of the cork. It smells like rotting wet cardboard. Believe me, you can’t mistake it. But there are there a range of other possible failures. Not all bacteria find wine a hostile environment. Most red wine is bottled with a tiny trace of sulphur dioxide in solution, as a preservative.
Left out and not refrigerated any solution of nutrients, including wine, is going to be the subject of microbial colonisation. Which ones is going to be a matter of luck. Depends what spores and contamination you have in your house. But it will take time. But probably the main concern is that you won’t get proper nasties like salmonella or botulism in wine.
White wine is a bit more fragile than red. Oxidisation will typically wipe any nice flavours out reasonably quickly, and it isn’t bottled with sulphur dioxide, but it will hopefully be bottled with the air gap filled with CO[sub]2[/sub] or nitrogen. Again, if it tastes OK, it is OK. If it tastes great, it is great.
And buy a vacuum wine preserver. Every household should have one. They can make wine last a long time once opened.
For practical purposes wine is antimicrobial, while you will want to avoid drinking wine that has been in direct contact with raw meat, but compared to other food stuffs it will be low risk as the bacteria that cause most problems cannot deal with the acidity or the ethanol.
While without actual tests it is impossible to know it is more than likely that the wine tasted acidic due to bacteria that is common and tolerant, primarily acetobacter. Their claim to fame is converting ethanol to acetic acid in the presence of oxygen, they produce vinegar.
Both alcohol and acetic acid inhibit other microbes. As wine is alcoholic and acidic enough there is little no risk of mold.
Due to the fact that this process uses wild microbes it probably is not acidic enough to kill off any harmful bacteria but that would primarily be a concern if you are trying to make your own vinegar for pickling etc, but the risk would be a lack of acidity to inhibit growth of bacteria in food-stocks.
The primary risk is the taste, and if you are drinking it for the effects of alcohol you may be seriously disappointed as it is probably now very very low proof.
The risks are very low, but so are the potential benefits.
