As you know, wine is born as the result of a biochemical fermentation process in which, thanks to the action of yeasts, the components of the must are transformed, giving rise to a wine with its different nuances of flavor, aroma and color.

This transformation of must into wine takes place in controlled environments in wineries like ours, but once the bottle arrives at your home it is important that you take these recommendations into account in order to know how to store the wine at home and in this way you can enjoy him in all his glory for the longest time.

 As a wine lover, you may have ever wondered if you are storing bottles well so that the wine maintains all the flavor and qualities. To know about storing wine at home, if you don't have a wine fridge or wine cellar, take our advice into account and try to recreate the conditions somewhere in your home.

On the other hand, if you decide to invest in a wine refrigerator, tell yourself that there are different sizes and prices and their function is to keep the wines in the optimal conditions of temperature and humidity. The advantage is mainly that you do not have to be aware and that you always find your wines at the ideal temperature.

Photo: Heath Rasmussen

1. Ideal temperature to preserve the wine

The temperature of the place where we keep our wine bottles is one of the main factors that we must pay attention to in order to prevent our wines from spoiling. Ideally, the wine should be at a constant temperature between 8ºC and 16ºC. In no case should the place where you store your bottles exceed 22ºC.
On the other hand, we must bear in mind that serving a wine that is too cold, especially in reds, helps the nuances of its aromas disappear and cannot be appreciated.
We must also be careful to avoid thermal oscillations, that is, that the temperature of the wine bottle does not vary much, so it would be appropriate not to store it in places where the temperature is changing. For this reason it is not advisable to store wine in the kitchen where the temperature can rise several degrees sharply when we cook. It is also not a good idea to store your wine near a heat source such as an oven or radiator. It would be best to store the wine bottles in a cellar or basement, although this is not always possible because of space. Don't worry, a storage room, a cupboard, a closet where there are no heating or air conditioning systems will serve you. It is also a good idea to place a thermometer next to the wines to have a control of the temperature.

2. Environmental humidity to preserve the wine

Just as important as controlling the temperature of the place where we keep our wine bottles, it is also important to monitor the relative humidity of the environment. If there is little humidity, the cork dries and becomes porous. The place we choose must be cool and the relative humidity must be between 60 and 80% so that the cork does not dry out or become damp.
If the cork dries out, the stopper would tend to shrink, so air could enter the bottle and lead to a loss of volume and premature oxidation of the wine. Otherwise, if the cork is too wet, the necessary conditions would be in place to favor the appearance of molds and fungi that can spoil the wine. To avoid this, nothing better than using a hygrometer next to the bottles, so that we will have under control that the wine doesn't undergo large changes in the humidity of the environment.

3. Avoid exposing the wine to direct light

Both natural and artificial light is harmful to the conservation of wine since it degrades it, deteriorating both the color and the aromas of the wines. It is very important that the place where we store the bottles is dark since the incidence of light on the bottles can favor chemical reactions such as oxidation of the wine, with the consequent loss of quality.
For these reasons, among others, it is why the green color is still maintained in most wine bottles that we find on the market, since this color is capable of neutralizing between 30% and 60% of light radiation. . If the place we have chosen to store our wine has a lot of light, it is better to keep the bottles in closed furniture or boxes.

Photo @lobo_de_bar

4. Storage position of the wine bottles

The position in which we store our wine bottles is also very important when it comes to preserving their organoleptic characteristics. That is why we will always place our bottles in a horizontal position. There are countless bottle racks of different shapes and materials that are very useful for storing your bottles. In this way we will allow the wine and the cork to be in permanent contact and at the same time we will prevent the cork from drying out, which would lose its elasticity and the closure of the bottle would cease to be hermetic. We will also try to avoid that the bottles suffer from shaking or sudden movements, to allow the wine to rest properly and evolve in the most natural way possible.

5. Sparkling wines, better to store vertically

As an exception to the previous point, we will place the sparkling wines (cavas, champagne, etc.) in a vertical position. In these wines, the presence of carbon dioxide, which tends to rise, allows the stopper to maintain the ideal humidity level. Furthermore, the very vertical arrangement of the bottle also favors the very preservation of carbonic in these beverages.

Siós Brut Blanc de Noirs Magnum in wooden box

6. Conservation of wine once opened

Once we have opened a bottle of wine, if we are not going to finish it at once, it is better to keep the wine in the refrigerator. Before, we must minimize the contact between the wine and the air contained in the bottle to avoid oxidation. To achieve this, we can change the wine to a smaller bottle and close it tightly by pressing the cork firmly. The ideal would be to use a manual vacuum pump to extract the oxygen from the inside of the bottle, which will help us not to rust quickly.
Unlike the unopened wine bottles that we kept horizontally, the ones that we have already opened are better kept vertically so that the surface of the wine in contact with the air is less.
Anyway, keep in mind that once the bottle of wine is opened you will only be able to prolong its qualities for a few days. In the case of white or rosé wines in 3 or 5 days they will have lost their flavor and in the case of red wines you can keep them for a maximum of 6 days.

Now that you know how to store wine at home, we invite you to visit our wine store and choose one of our wines to start creating your own wine cellar.