Friday, December 23, 2005

The 20 minute rule

Another Alameda Sun Article......

The Twenty Minute Rule

Like the Three Bears of the nursery story, most of us tend to serve our wine either too warm or too cold, hardly ever just right. We seldom serve wine at proper temperature, and this contributes to almost as much bad-tasting wine as bad wine itself.

The problem stems from a bit of an oft-misunderstood wine wisdom: serve white wine cold, red wine at room temperature. Many people think that room temperature for reds means whatever temperature their room happens to be, and that chilling a white wine means that it’s at it’s best right out of the refrigerator.

This notion is reinforced by many restaurants that serve wines at the wrong temp, sending an incorrect message to their patrons about proper wine service temperature. This is disconcerting, as many of us look to restaurants for our cues about wine etiquette.

Room Temperature is not the temperature of your room, rather the temperature of some drafty castle in France or England without the central heating that is ubiquitous in the States. Most home refrigerators are set to 36-40°F; great for preserving milk, but horrible for serving wine.

When white wines are served too cold, the buttery notes of a California Chardonnay or the flintiness of a Sancerre (Loire Valley Sauvignon Blanc) are masked - revealing little but chilly and/or metallic notes. White wines always show their aromatic and flavor qualities better when they aren't ice cold.

Above 72°F, red wine tends to break down into its separate components: alcohol, fruit, tannin, and acid. This gives reds a heavy and out of balance character, with hot, alcoholic, and flabby flavors overwhelming the finesse and finish that the winemaker intended. Try drinking a high alcohol Amador Zin at ambient temperature on a warm day and you’ll see what I mean.

Think I’m crazy? Try the following experiment at home. Buy two identical bottles of white wine, and place them both in the fridge. Take one out 20 minutes before you want to drink it, and take the second one out 20 minutes later. Open them both, and pour out two glasses. Taste them both. Which one tastes better (not colder, not more refreshing, but better)? Which reveals more fruit and nuance? Which has more complexity, more of those pompous adjectives that wine geeks throw out at every chance?

Try the same thing on a hot day with red wines. Take two identical bottles of red and place one in the fridge for 20 minutes or so, and leave the other out on the counter. I’ll bet that the colder red delivers more of what it is that you like about red wine: balance, flavor, fruit, and finish.

Try to remember the Jeff Diamond 20 Minute Rule: get your red wines into the fridge 20 minutes before you drink them, and your white wines out of the fridge 20 minutes before serving. Exceptions to this rule are for rosés, Loire Valley Cabernet Francs and Beaujolais, which need to be a few degrees warmer than whites; fortified wines, which should be a tad warmer than Reds; and dessert wines, which should be a bit colder than whites. (Generally, the sweeter the wine, the colder the serving temperature).

A bottle of wine will chill in the fridge or an ice bucket at about 4°F per ten minutes, and will warm up out of the fridge at about the same rate. The best method to chill a bottle quickly is to use a bucket, filled with ice cubes and water, and let it chill for 20-25 minutes. It’s okay if you don’t have a fancy crystal or silver champagne bucket; a bowl or a pitcher large enough to hold the ice, water and a bottle will do just fine.

Don’t ever put a bottle into the freezer for rapid chilling. Rapid temperature change is never good for a fine wine, and more importantly, a forgotten bottle could either freeze or even explode.

When dining out, don't hesitate to adjust the temperature of your wine. If your Chardonnay is ice cold, take it out of the ice bucket and put it on the table for a few minutes. And don’t ask your server to warm up a bottle for you, I’ve heard of restaurants warming too cold wines in a microwave oven! If the red wine is too warm, ask the server for an ice bucket and use it judiciously.

Weather can be a factor, too. On a sweltering day, all wines - reds and whites - should be served a bit cooler than indicated in this article. Conversely, if you are in a chilly environment, adjust the temperature of the wines up by a degree or two.

Here are some optimal wine serving temperatures:

Whites: 45-50 °F
Reds: 50-65 °F
Rosés: 48-55 °F
Sparkling: 42-52 °F
Fortified wines: 55-68 °F
Dessert Wines: 41-46°F

Posted by Farmstead :: 5:43 PM :: 0 comments

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