Looking for some advice and info

[Innkeeper]

I cook dinner in our house. If we are drinking any red wine other than Beaujolais with it, I decant the wine and put it on the table before starting to cook. That usually does the trick. On those very rare occasions when longer breathing is required, I usually screw up.

[Zinner]

A lot of the wines you're drinking may not need to be decanted or left to breathe. If you're happy with the way they taste, sip away. Perhaps the point is that if a wine doesn't instantly appeal to your palate, then you might give it some time to open up and see what you think. Different flavors may develop over a period of time.

An example might help. A friend and I were tasting wines at a shop in Berkeley. She liked all the wines except one and she said to me that she saw no possibilities at all for that wine. My friend is a partner in a Napa winery and knows wine and food. I agreed that it was tough and tannic. But I said that a whisper of fruit and spice on the finish(flavor left in the mouth after you swallow the wine)made me think the wine could improve.

Fortunately the shop folks knew I was headed up to Sonoma to taste with a couple of winemakers and insisted that I take along a few bottles including the tannic monster. In the two or three hours it took to get around to tasting again, both of the winemakers and I agreed the wine was rather good. Still tannic, but yeilding to some lovely dark fruit.

Some was left over and the next day I had it again with some curry chicken for lunch. By this time, the wine was just stunning with loads of dark berry rounded out with flavors of spice, espresso and cola. Stood up to the curry and then some. All it took was some time. The wine was a red from the Languedoc region in France(likely syrah, grenache, perhaps mourvedre, the grapes) and sold for around $12-14 at the time.

When you open a bottle of wine, it will evolve over time. This can be good(it can develop flavors) or it can be bad(it can lose flavors). It's not always predictable and even experts can misjudge. That's one of the fascinating things about wine--that it is sort of like a kaleidoscope in a glass and will show you different sides of its character if you give it a chance.

[hotwine]

Well said, Zinner.

The only way I've found to get any sort of handle on the decanting question is to buy multiple bottles and try them with different decanting times: zero for the first, half an hour for the second, an hour for the third, and two hours for the fourth... and keep notes with each bottle. One of those samples should shine above the rest. That's not foolproof by any means.... and what shows for one vintage may not show again for next year's. Every bottling is different, as is every vintage of every wine. So many choices, so little time. Read, taste, make notes, taste, read, read, read.

[EzCrash]

Wow ! I have certainly learned quite a bit during the course of this thread. Again, I thank you all for your advice and info.

[pinotgrigio&redsox_fan]

EZCrash, any chance I can get you to email me the word document of all the advice you get when you've finished it??? If not, I'll understand. Thx in advance.

[wondersofwine]

Welcome to the board PinotG. Hope to see you entering your own questions or tasting notes.

[EzCrash]

Sure, post your e-mail address and I will gladly send you the Word document that I made.

[EzCrash]

Better yet, keep your e-mail secret to avoid spammers and just download it from my webspace.

http://members.cox.net/ezcrash1/wine.doc