Hi, I've started drinking wine with dinner for the health benefits. The reason you can't just take a pill is because reservatol degrades as soon as it contacts oxygen. This also means that you get less reservatol the second day after you open the wine. Is there some kind of spout you can push through the cork, which would allow the wine to get out but no air to get it? thx.
Hello, snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com! You wrote on 6 Nov 2006 06:31:12 -0800:
sg> Hi, sg> I've started drinking wine with dinner for the health sg> benefits. The reason you can't just take a pill is because sg> reservatol degrades as soon as it contacts oxygen. This sg> also means that you get less reservatol the second day sg> after you open the wine. Is there some kind of spout you sg> can push through the cork, which would allow the wine to sg> get out but no air to get it? thx.
I think you might run up against physics here :-) The space left has to be filled with something if you want flow to continue. I suppose it might be possible to have a system where the wine was blown out with nitrogen but it sounds complicated and expensive. What do wine bars do, I wonder, or do they rely on fast sales?
James Silverton Potomac, Maryland
E-mail, with obvious alterations: not.jim.silverton.at.comcast.not
no, but the collapsing bag style (bag in box that someone mentioned in earlier thread) is designed to minimize aeration.
snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com wrote:
You're seriously overestimating the rate of oxidation of resveratrol. We made some resveratrol and stored it in a refrigerator for a month or so. After that time, there was no sign of chemical degradation as judged by NMR spectroscopy. Of course, we weren't leaving it exposed on a countertop, but it's not strongly reactive with oxygen.
Nonetheless, it's always a good idea to keep oxygen away from an opened wine. There's now an entry on how to do that in the alt.food.wine FAQ, which I have copied below:
The primary enemy of wine is oxygen (even though proper aging of wine requires it). Once wine is opened, it starts changing due to its interaction with the air. In some cases this is good (a wine "opening up" in flavor over the course of the meal, or even overnight in the case of some older reds), but it will always end badly if enough time elapses. If you haven't finished a bottle and want to save it for later consumption, the best thing to do is to retard its reaction with oxygen. Putting it in the refrigerator slows down the reactions, so this is a good idea even for reds. (they should be warmed up again before serving). Just corked back up, whites could go for a day or three (depending on the kind and quality of the wine, the amount left in the bottle, and your own palate), reds might last a week that way. Probably the best method is to rebottle the wine in a smaller bottle (such as a half bottle whose bottle you saved), allowing very little air between the top of the wine and the cork. (that area is called the "ullage"). When inserting the cork, put the end of a paper clip, or a nail, or a wire, partially into the neck of the bottle as you insert the cork as a spacer, allowing air to escape (so that pressure doesn't build up). Then remove the object, allowing the cork to spring back. Tilt the bottle to wet the cork, but then store upright for some time (to give the cork a chance to fully spring back. Be sure to label the bottle! Some say that wine rebottled this way could be put back in the cellar and left there another year. If you have smaller bottles that have screwcap closures, they are even better for storing excess wine. There are also several systems on the market to reduce the wine's exposure to oxygen. One is a hand pump and rubber stopper arrangement which reduces the pressure in the bottle. They are marketed under various names, including Vac-U-Vin. Follow the directions and do not pump the wine down too much, or the volitiles in the wine will also evaporate, leaving a wine "dead". Opinion is divided on whether wine preserved with these devices tastes the same, with some people feeling that wine loses some of its aromatic character when treated this way. Those who favor its use say that proper use can extend the wine's life, allowing a red wine to be stored for as much as two weeks in the refrigerator under some circumstances before it becomes less than interesting. Your own reaction may be different, of course. Another wine preservation device is a gas displacement system. Typically the gas is Nitrogen or Argon; it is introduced into the bottle, displacing the air that was there before, and then the bottle is resealed. The cheapest version is a spray can filled with a mixture of nitrogen and carbon dioxide. It will likely do only a little to preserve the wine due to the difficulty in removing all of the oxygen this way. Given a choice, argon is a better gas to use because, since it's heavier than air it will settle in the headspace of the bottle and also leach out of the sealed bottle more slowly (it's also much more costly, though). Even so, don't expect to store wines using canned gas for more than a few days. More effective devices use a bubbler (such as is used in fishtanks) to bubble nitrogen through the wine and incorporate it into a tight seal for the bottle. Such devices are marketed under the name Winekeeper and are sold online through Wine Enthusiast
HTH Mark Lipton
I used to use a product called Vacu-Vin - there is a black one and a white one. Black one is better because it clicks when you've drawn out enough air.
For the day or two that I stored an opened wine under this closure, they seemed pretty much unchanged. Never tried it with a white wine.
-ben
Wine Enthusiast sells (or sold), a nitrogen purge unit that used a canister, attached to a spout top w/ a tube into the bottom of the bottle. The pressure of the nitrogen (or that in the bottle once "charged") pushed the wine out of the spout. The canister could be disconnected and a oneway valve kept the pressure up. IIRC, this comes (came) in either a 1 btl. or 2 btl. unit. I have the 2 btl. but there is no name, other than the WE logo, and no model #. There is also a commercial unit w/ chiller that works on the same principle. It comes in 3 btl. to 12 btl. sizes, but is quite pricy - ~US1200 for the small unit.
I gave up on using the rig, as the Vac-u-vins seemed to do as good a job, but then for the OP's purpose, they would not be quite the ticket.
Hunt
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