SO WE WERE at a dinner party and contemplating the pros and cons of aerating our wines, letting them breathe before serving, and what was hauled out of a cupboard reminded us of how decanters can vary in form and function. With the best intentions, my dear host presented a beautiful cut-glass, tear-drop shaped antique that could have been used as a receptacle for any number of purposes but which wasn't really suitable for our requirements.
Synonymous with fine wine glasses, Riedel of Austria are also famous for their decanters – ranging in size, shape and price from basic to beautiful, to the bizarre and the ridiculous. Loveable and laughable, some seem to have been designed by an artist given too much free rein – creations surely impossible to clean without great difficulty, named after creatures including the mamba, boa, flamingo, swan, duck and escargot. For more, see here. Alternatives include Spiegelau, Nachtmann and Bohemia Crystal.
Of course, there are two main reasons for decanting a wine: to separate it from sediment in the case of certain older wines, or to reveal more complexity in a younger wine, opening up the aromas and flavours – click here to see what Riedel have to say on the subject. Increasing a wine's contact with the air (oxidation) can also help to ‘smooth out' young and/or tannic wines, sometimes making the ordinary or harsh taste better than it would otherwise.
Aside from the process of dealing with sedimentary deposits or bottles in which the cork has crumbled… In the main, the idea behind effective, efficient decanting is to spread the wine over a large surface area, to expose it to plenty of air relative to the tiny amount present in the bottle under cork or screwcap. It might not be essential – in fact it might be something to avoid should, for instance, the wine be very mature and on the cusp of going downhill. But invariably it can make an appreciable difference for the better.
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I bought the hubby a decanter many moons ago (almost exactly like the one pictured in your article), and used to use it all the time! Not being able to afford older wines, we found the improvement quite noticeable on the younger wines we were drinking at the time! The only downside… it’s quite a challenge to pour out of one of these!!!