Frequently asked questions
Can vintage wines be drunk?
All the wines on our website are basically drinkable.
All our wines are stored in the best conditions and undergo quality control to ensure the best possible quality. Wine goes through a long process when it is stored and with +20 years in the bottle, aroma and taste notes can be very different.
What to expect when drinking vintage wine?
It is first and foremost important to deal with what you encounter when you move out into this special universe. In any case, it is certain that you should not expect the same as when you drink young wines.
The primary fruit is no longer dominant, but rather the tertiary scent and flavor notes which only develop during aging. If you are lucky, these vintage wines are some of the most wonderful, and the aging notes are complex and diverse. The wine is old and has been locked in the bottle. There will often be notes of mushrooms, gunpowder and parmesan before the fruit penetrates through oxygenation. The wine is ok if there is fruit in the aroma and taste.
How to prepare and open vintage wine?
It is important to ensure that the wine has stood upright for at least 2 days and preferably longer before opening.
This is purely so that it can settle and the sediments can fall to the bottom. If the wine has traveled by parcel post, it is even more important that it has the opportunity to settle down, as motion sickness is to be expected.
Opening can be done with an ordinary corkscrew, but it is clearly easier to open with an "Ah-so". If you don't already have an ah-so opener, you can buy one on our website.
Should it be unlucky that there are cork residues in the wine, these can be poured into a sample glass or through a strainer into a decanter.
How long should the wine be oxygenated?
There is no exact science to the oxygenation of vintage wine, but after opening +1000 bottles, a picture begins to emerge. The challenge in connection with oxygenation is that the wine relatively quickly goes towards the vinegar state when it is exposed to oxygen.
Whether it takes 30 minutes or 24 hours is individual from bottle to bottle and depends on the method you choose for oxygenation.
The first oxygenation variant is Slow Ox in a bottle, where you pour a little from the top of the bottle, so that the oxygenation surface in the bottle becomes a little larger. It is then left to stand for at least 5 hours and in some cases even longer. This method is slow, but is particularly effective with Riserva varieties.
Another variation is Slow Ox in carafe or margaret bowl, which in principle works like the first method, but more uncontrolled. The recommendation for this method is to keep an eye on the wine while smelling or tasting it in the process.
Third variant is an oxygenation of approx. 30 minutes in a carafe, while simultaneously ensuring that no precipitate comes from the bottle.
Fourth variant is oxygenation in the bottle for approx. 1 hour followed by approx. 10 minutes in the glass. Here you will find that most of the pent-up notes from many years of confinement have disappeared and the fruit emerges from the glass.
The fifth variant is the one I personally use, where you pour the wine directly into the glass after opening and take the whole experience from the first strange enclosed notes, and quietly experience the fruit seeping through before the oxidation takes over and the wine eventually collapsing. A wonderful journey that can vary from 30 minutes to 24 hours and sometimes longer.
