email this pageWine expert Charles Smothermon answers your questions.
Q: At our house we never finish a bottle of wine in one evening. How should I store the leftovers?
A: Oxidation is the culprit responsible for handing opened wine a one-way ticket to destination: vinegar. The easiest way to slow it down is to simply shove the cork back in and stick the wine in the ?fridge. But refrigerating alone isn?t failsafe, and in my opinion, works far better for white wines than it does for high-quality reds. A better route is to minimize wine?s contact with the villain?oxygen. One way to do this is by transferring the wine to a smaller container?preferably one just big enough to hold it. Empty half-size (375ml) wine bottles often are perfect for this.
Or, you can eliminate oxygen-wine contact with one of several available products. One type utilizes a special stopper and pump to vacuum oxygen from the bottle. Another consists of a gas sprayed into the bottle to form a barrier between wine and oxygen.
For sparkling wines, I recommend picking up an inexpensive (less than $10) sparkling wine stopper. Sealed with one of these and kept refrigerated, a bottle of bubbly can last up to several days.
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