okay most people would say that a wine would taste better as it ages…personally i drink them every now and then but i do not know how to aprreciate them as i am only seventeen!!!not even legal in my country to drink alcoholic stuff…which leads me to thinking what is the oldest wine in the world?who has it and what year was it made??anyone has some answers??and also is alcohol really bad for you??I mean i have heard it has some benefits but it could also damage your liver or something…
If you do a Google search on “oldest wine” you’ll get dozens of hits; they’ve found wine in archaeological excavations that is thousands of years old.
If you’re asking “what’s the oldest drinkable wine”, that’s a different story. Although some wine is made to be aged, no wine ages forever. Sauternes, a sweet white wine, is often mentioned when people talk about the types of wine that ages the longest - 40 to 60 years is not unheard of, and collectors will go for bottles that are older than that.
In general practice, French reds such as Bordeaux and Burgundy are what people usually think of when they think of wines meant to be aged. Most of those age well for ten or fifteen years; after that, they begin the long slow descent into vinegar.
Neat that you’re interested in wine so young; I know you’re not legal yet, but when you are, I urge you to try wines. I developed a love of wines when I was young, and it’s been a lot of fun learning and exploring.
As far as your other question, yes, alcohol, like many things, can be bad for you if you overdo it. Drinking to excess can cause diseases like cirrhosis, a disease of the liver, which even if mild will severely change your lifestyle, and can easily kill you. Alcoholism isn’t a pretty sight; it can ruin you and your loved one’s lives.
That said, many people can and do enjoy alcohol in moderation. A rule of thumb is no more than one drink an hour. When you are old enough to drink, you’ll need to learn your tolerance - after you drink a little too much a couple times, you’ll figure out how much is OK and how much makes you sick. And, like you mentioned, alcohol - especially wine - in moderation is considered good for your health. Just remember, there’s a world of difference between a couple of glasses of wine with dinner, and slamming down half a bottle of cheap vodka on a regular basis.
Madeira wine is tough as old boots and is drinkable even when over a 100 years old. This partly to do with the treatment it receives during its early life. The wine is heated to 60 degrees C and held at that temperature for several months. It also has brandy added to it. This seems to “preserve” the wine and stop it deteriorating over time. In the old days they used to use barrels of Madeira as ballast in the sailing ships. These barrels would spend several months at sea in the tropical heat before returning back to the island for bottling. Even an opened bottle of Madeira will stay drinkable for a year.
Back in February, 2003 I drank some port that had been sitting in a cask in some castle since the late 1800s. It was very smooth and honeyed.
Just to make it clear, older <> better for wine once you get past a certain point. That point varies by wine but it could be anywhere from a few months to a few decades. Wines older than that may have problems with their corks which ruins the entire bottle.
There is also a market for wines that are never supposed to be open or drunk oddly enough. Aerchaeological wine and wine from historical figures like Thomas Jefferson are among those. I saw a morning program once where they opened up wine from a shipwreck poured, and everyone on the program to a drink all at once. They basically convulsed and one almost threw up right on camera.
I had a 121 year old port at a friend’s 21st b-day party. Yummie.
-Tcat
I think it’s woth noting that there’s a big old difference between fortified wines like Port, Madeira, and the like, and normal wines. As has been pointed out, the extra alcohol content preseves the wine by killing off anything that might spoil it.
How long can liquor stay preserved in an intact container? It’s an old Russian story cliche to fish out a case of French cognac that was sunk with some ship during the Napoleonic wars and have it not only drinkable but superb. Assuming it was uncontaminated by water, I can believe that it was drinkable but what does aging it in a glass bottle for 200 years do to it that could possibly be benefitial?