decanting

[Georgie]

Here's a real newbie question. When you say you decant wines for awhile, does that mean just uncorking the bottle or actually pouring the wine out into another container?

[Bucko]

The latter....

[Drew]

I think of decanting in two ways.
1. Older wines, as well as some young ones, tend to throw sediment so they need to be decanted either through a filtering device or slowly into a decanter to separate the sediment from the wine.
2.Pouring the wine into a wide based decanter to allow optimal exposure to air to open the wine.

Drew

[This message has been edited by Drew (edited 05-04-2003).]

[Georgie]

Does just the base need to be wide? I have a gorgeous Waterford piece which was my mother's. I think she called it a wine decanter. It has a very wide base but a narrow neck with a stopper. Is that what to use?

[hotwine]

The Waterford decanter is lead crystal, Georgie. Recommend you use it only for decoration. I've got several, all now out of service. They're 29% lead, if I remember correctly. A very wide base and very narrow neck suggest a ship's decanter, so shaped to anchor it on a captain's table and prevent spills during the ship's rockin' an' a-rollin' at sea.


For decanting, a wide-mouth container works best. I use a glass flower vase, with about a 3" wide mouth.

[This message has been edited by hotwine (edited 05-04-2003).]

[Innkeeper]

Or you could get a bottle of Paul Masson and use it for cooking or whatever, and then use the bottle as a decanter.

[Thomas]

Now that is a wine man thinking...

[Georgie]

Well, I've certainly got lots of glass vases such as that you've described. But are you saying there's a danger of lead poisoning coming from using lead crystal? I've never heard of that.

[Georgie]

I just went on Ask Jeeves to find out about lead poisoning from crystal decanters. Seems you shouldn't store your wine or distilled liquors in the lead crystal, but no real time frame was given. I guess it's just best to avoid it altogether as Hotsie says. Who knew? And here I thought I was safe since I stopped gnawing on the woodwork....Thanks for the tip!

[This message has been edited by Georgie (edited 05-04-2003).]

[tandkvd]

Well, I have been using the decanter that my wife and I recieved for a wedding gift 18 years ago. It had never been used until this year. It came as a set with 4 wine glases. I never cared to much for the wine glasses because they have a small bowl and long delicate steems. However the decanter does have wide base and a long slim neck, and my wife said it probaly is made of lead crystal.
Guess I'll have to get a bottle of Paul Mason.

[hotwine]

We had a thread on using lead crystal a few months ago, and Bucko did the medical research, and posted results. It shouldn't be difficult to find.

[Georgie]

Thanks Hotsie. I found the thread.
http://www.wines.com/ubb2/Forum37/HTML/001991.html
Very interesting. Learn something new every day!

[Thomas]

The thing about lead is that, take it in for a long period of time and you ultimately can't learn something new any day. Did you know that all politicians drink from lead crystal??? [img]http://www.wines.com/ubb2/eek.gif[/img]



[This message has been edited by foodie (edited 05-06-2003).]