How to Preserve Wine Once It's Open

Wine is a living, ever changing, ever evolving liquid that is difficult to make but easy to spoil. Many of the ways that wine can go bad happen long before it ever reaches the consumer, but there are a number of things that happen to wine post-purchase that can lead to a bad experience. Opening a bottle and letting the wine oxidize is the most common way that a wine goes bad. There are a number of ways to avoid this, and one of them is likely to work for you.

Instructions

1. Asphyxiate your wine with a wine pump. Wine oxidizes when exposed to oxygen. If you remove most of the oxygen (or lower the amount) surrounding the wine, the wine will age slower and, therefore, last longer. The wine pump comes in two parts: a rubber stopper to plug up the neck of the wine bottle, and a pump that sucks the air out of the bottle. You simply place the stopper in the bottle, attach the pump to the stopper and begin pumping. The stopper’s spout will let air be pumped out of the bottle, but will not let any in. After 15 or 20 pumps, your wine's oxygen level will be drastically reduced, and your bottle will be good for an additional 2 or 3 days.

2. Apply nitrogen. Working on the same basic principles as the wine pump, the nitrogen system of wine preservation works with a small compressed can of nitrogen and a stopper. By spraying nitrogen into the bottle of wine, you are evacuating the oxygen inside. The nitrogen will stay inside the bottle and won't flow out (because nitrogen is heavier than oxygen). It is inert and will not impart a bad taste to the wine, either. Once you have pumped the bottle full of nitrogen, pop on the cap and enjoy your wine for an additional 3 days.

3. Spring-load your bottle of bubbly. With champagne and sparkling wine, preserving the product becomes a different matter. Instead of taking away a gas, you want to retain it and trap it, in a sense. The answer is a spring-loaded champagne cork. This is a small device that consists of a metal cap with two swinging arms and a spring-loaded rubber cork. The rubber cork fits easily inside the neck of the champagne bottle. Once in, you simply push down to secure the seal and bring the metal arms down underneath the lip of the opening, holding the tight seal in place. If kept like this, the bottle of bubbles will drink well for another week or so.

4. Refrigerate your wine. The simplest and most overlooked way to prolong the life of your open bottle of wine is by refrigerating it. Whether it's white or red, wine's oxidization slows down the colder it gets. If you know that you won't finish that bottle of Cab until Thursday and it's only Tuesday, stick it in the refrigerator. Pull the bottle out an hour or two before serving to get the bottle back to room temperature.