There are close to a hundred bottles in my wine cellar–not because I thoughtfully plan to cellar bottles that will improve with aging–but because I can buy a lot faster than I can drink.
Most of us buy wine to drink it. Estimates range from 70% to 90% of all wine bought is consumed within 24 hours of purchase. Even more amazing, 95% is drunk within a week.
But suppose you and I decided to that we would be more specific in our purchases and give wine collecting a try. We’d want to buy with the thought that we wouldn’t be drinking any of these bottles for way longer than a week. And I don’t know about you, but my pocketbook doesn’t stretch to terribly expensive wines so I wouldn’t want to spend a fortune. I’m willing to spend more than the average that people pay for a bottle, which is about $6.22, but I’m not comfortable above about $30 a bottle.
Dorothy J. Gaiter and John Brecher, who wrote the wine column for The Wall Street Journal until 2009, had some great suggestions for picking beginning a cellar back in 2003. For one thing, they suggested you start small and only plan to buy a case of wines for cellaring and then plan to keep it for only two to three years before you beginning trying out the wines. I think I can survive delayed gratification that long.
While some of their suggestions may be dated, I think they form a great skeleton for a cellar collection. Among their ideas are vineyards for a mid-range California Cabernet, American wines including a Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Syrah, and Italian and French choices. One surprise was that they recommended laying down an American sparkling wine, like Roederer Estate Brut from California. They say they have found that good California bubbly seems to calm down and get richer and nuttier with even a little bit of cellaring.
Once upon a time I believed that the older a wine was, the better. That was until we opened bottle after bottle of Dom Perignon 1963 for a Millenium celebration in 2000–only to taste bottle after bottle of sparkling vinegar. It turns out, according to Gaiter and Brecher, you should NOT cellar French Champagne. Oops!
To see their specific suggestions, follow this link.
Will Lyons, current wine columnist for WSJ, has slightly more expensive tastes. His cellar is meant to be the repository for wines you can pull out for all occasions. But his five year group might help you amplify your choices since wines from Chile, Australia, and New Zealand have come on strong since 2003. He says: “Look to Bordeaux, the Rhône Valley, Burgundy, Australian Shiraz from Coonawarra, Syrahs from New Zealand and many Portuguese reds. These are your wines that can be aged for five years or more, will improve with time and are fascinating to taste as they evolve.”
To see the rest of Will’s suggestions, click here.
After you finally choose your wines, the rest of the directions are pretty simple: take your case of wine and lay the wines flat in a place where it’s dark, with a moderate temperature. Keep them out of the light, out of the garage, away from the kitchen and the stove. A cupboard under a staircase or a basement space can be good as long as it stays cool. The ideal wine cellar temperature is between 55ºF and 58ºF. If you don’t keep your house that cold, any temperature between 40º–65ºF can work, as long as it remains constant.