I was at dinner tonight with my girlfriend’s parents and I guess her father is a wine conisseur. I started pouring everyone a glass of Mirassou Pinot Noir and he went apeshit saying that I had to let it breathe first. Is there any technical data stating any sort of chemical change that would be noticed by taste by letting it sit for a few minutes or was he just looking for a reason to hate me? Wouldn’t pouring it let it “breathe” quicker?
-M
I don’t know the chemistry of it but they do make things to speed up that process. Basically a long syringe type needle (not sharp) and a very small pump at the top that would aerate the wine before drinking it.
Ive seen those at the Sharper Image. He actually opened the bottle himself with his own bottle opener. It was the kind where you turn the cork screw in, tilt it and the lip hits the bottle and you pull it up, nothing fancy…I think he’s just an asshole and he doesn’t like me.
-M
Yes, for fine red wines you do get better taste by letting the wine breathe a bit. You’ll often see wine decanted into special bottles that allow a large surface area of the wine to be exposed to the air.
http://www.winestuff.com/acatalog/Decanters.html
Here’s the quick aerator:
It’s questionable weather you’d notice the difference in a bottle of table wine, but fine red wines definately benefit from exposure to some air.
It’ll actually breathe better in a glass than a bottle, though. There’s not much exposed surface area (in relation to volume) in a full bottle - it would have to sit a few hours before you’d notice a difference. If it really needs to breathe it should be decanted. I never bother, but then, I don’t spend a lot on my wine.
Sounds like your girlfriend’s father is being a pretentious prick, no offense. If by “breathing” he meant properly decanting, as mentioned above, then yeah, it does improve the boquet of a young wine. However, if by “breathing” he simply meant leaving the cork out of the wine for a an hour, then I’m afraid he’s pretty much full of it.
Heh. I’m gonna tell my dad. He’s a big bottle breather. Nyah! Nyah!
Can’t find the cite, sorry, but I read about two scientists who did a whole bunch of tests on wine. Decanting was the best, followed by 3 to 5 minutes in the glass and ‘breathing’ in the bottle as a waste of time.
-Tcat
An open bottle will breathe; it’s just slow. I once left an undistinguished bottle of red opened on my counter for a few days; it turned delicious.
But just opening the bottle and letting it sit for a couple of minutes isn’t going to do much. Decanting is the way to go – pouring the wine mixes it with air much quicker, and you can keep the sediment out of your glass.
Next time, pour him a glass, pull out a straw, blow some bubbles in the wine and hand it to him. If you want, you can leave the straw in the glass.
Next time (if there is a next time) ask him where his decanter is…tell him only an ignorant ass would think just having the bottle open for a couple of minutes would do any good. Then explain that pouring it in a glass would speed the process if he could contain himself for a bit.
Or use the straw…tell him that is the new fad from “the Continent”, that ought to set him back a little.
Should make for some great dinner conversation.
I’m not actually calling anybody who lets wine breathe in the bottle an ignorant ass. I know that is a widely used method. I just wanted to give the OP a burr to place under the saddle of the GFs dad.
Heh heh…that sounds like a good idea.
-M
You must do a double blind taste test with him. See if he can reliably tell the difference between wine just from the bottle and wine that has been sitting out open for an hour.
You know what they say, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. I’d agree with the others in this thread: It sounds like your potential father-in-law (sorry, just trying to scare you) knows about wine breathing, which does in fact make a difference, but doesn’t know the specifics, and is just using it to lord over people. Talking out of school, in other words.
While hard-core wine people might say you could “bruise” the wine by pouring it into glasses before it’s had a chance to breathe in a properly-angled decanter or whatever, in point of fact, for the sort of wine you describe in the OP, you probably had the correct approach: Pour directly into glasses and wait ten minutes before drinking.
Wine may also be a new hobby/interest for your GF’s father. The initial infatuation with the interest may be clouding his reasonableness. If that’s the case, he’ll come back down to earth. When he does it may be better if it’s not scorched.
My recollection from dating a wine snob -
The chemical shift is in tannins, acids that build up in red wines during fermentation. Tannins have a low vapor pressure, and thus evaporate relatively quickly. The more the tannins evaporate, the less acidic the wine will taste. That’s why everyone else here has (quite properly) recommended a decanter. More surface area will allow the tannins to evporate more quickly than from the neck of the bottle.
I’m not sure the worry about “bruising,” except that it’s generally accepted that too much agitation of wines can cause a degridation of taste, so more than a gentle pouring into a decanter, and then into a glass is contraindicated. But if you weren’t sloshing the stuff like out of a firehose, it should be fairly safe, and odds are, your gf’s father was just being pretentious. FWIW.
I’ve done some exhaustive tests with Ripple and Thunderbird and have not discerned any appreciate able difference from straight out of the bottle, on first opening, nor an hour later after a short nap.
CelraySoda, if you want to be the bigger man, and get on his good side bring him a nice decanter as a gift next time your invited over for dinner. The “Duck” is very popular.
Of course if it’s a dead end relationship, tell that effete bastard to choke on his improperly served wine.
Decanters may not be a good idea as many of them contain lead. The crystal decanter, for instance, I believe, contains lead.
Slight hijack - white wine does not need to breathe…does it?