Storing your wine

• Stack wine on shelves made of wood, tile or cement because they resist temperature changes better than metal
• Store fortified wines standing up
• Store wines in such a way that you do not need to move them to reach a particular bottle... Once a wine is laid down, it should stay there until opened.
• Regard racked wine as your best cooling device... A high density of wine bottles will reduce wine temperature fluctuations because of their large volume and latent heat.

Air is the greatest enemy to a good wine and will turn it into vinegar. You will notice all through this guide that we concentrate on strategies to eliminate air from the bottle. Keep this in mind all the time.

Store wine with the label up. This helps in three ways:

• You can easily see what the wine is. You don't have to disturb the bottle to see what you've got in the cellar.
• The sediment that forms in a good wine will form on the opposite side of the label. You can see how heavy it is when the time comes to open the bottle and you decide to decant it or serve it from the bottle.
• The label is less likely to be damaged. If you're storing the wines as an investment, a damaged label will reduce the value. If you're cellaring your wines because you just enjoy good wines, a damaged label will still detract from its appearance on your table.

Dry wines and fortified wines will improve in mouthfeel and flavour with some bottle aging. On the other hand, if over-cellared, they can fade and loose some of their intensity.

Sparkling wines and champagnes can be stored standing up. The carbon dioxide naturally produced in the wine will form a layer in the neck and protect the wine from contact with the air. Carbon dioxide is heavier than air and will sit on top of the wine. The air (if there is any in there) will sit above the carbon dioxide.

Keep a cool, constant temperature

Store your wines between 12-16°C and make sure the temperature stays constant.

A good wine store has a constant cool temperature, is dark and has some humidity... In cool parts of the world such as Europe and across southern Australia, these conditions can be readily provided in a cellar which is under the building. Of course your house has to be built on a slope and be high enough to have a cellar underneath... The ground conditions maintain a steady cool temperature and the ground itself acts as insulation to the outside air which warms up in summer. Of course, the term "cellar" also means a wine store, and your cellar need not be in an actual cellar. It could be a cool room in the house or a large cupboard in the back of the garage.

There are two critical factors in the temperature at which wine is stored. The first is the actual storage temperature, and the second is the fluctuation in temperature. To achieve its maximum potential, wine should be stored at around 12-16°C (55-61°F) at 60 to 70% humidity.

Every degree higher than that shortens the maturation time of the wine. This does not mean to say that wine could not be stored at a constant 20°C... (68°F) But remember that if the experts say the wine should cellar for 10 years, under the warmer conditions, you should consider cellaring it for only 5 years, as wine matures much more rapidly in temperatures above 16°C. (61°F)

Heat is probably worse for wine than light. Wine can easily start to taste cooked after just a few weeks at higher temperatures. Store wine in the coolest spot in your home. If you live in an area where summer temperatures exceed 27°C, (80°F) you should keep your air conditioning set to a maximum temperature of 23°C. (73°F)

The degree and speed of the temperature change is critical. A gradual change between summer and winter of a few degrees won't matter. The same change each day will harm your wines by ageing them more rapidly, and not in a nice way.

Constant temperature is the first factor to get right. If there are fluctuations, the pressure inside the bottle on the cork will go up and down and these cyclical loads cause the cork to swell and contract repeatedly, losing its elasticity... Eventually, the cork will leak and the enemy of stored wine, oxygen, will enter. When air first comes into contact with wine, it releases flavour. That is why "breathing" a wine increases its aroma. However, after a day or two, the wine begins to spoil and after a week or two, will turn to vinegar. hence, leaking corks which allow air to enter the bottle and make contact with the wine are to be avoided at all costs.

A quick way to check for this is to remove the capsule. Do not do this if you are keeping the wine for investment purposes, as this can harm the value of the wine. Do this only if you are interested in keeping great drinking wines in your own cellar.

Even a steady storage temperature of 21°C (70°F) is better than temperature which goes from 7°C to 18°C (45°F - 65°F) and back again every day.

At 12-16°C, the wine will age properly, enabling it to fully develop. Higher temperatures will age wine more rapidly and cooler temperatures will slow down the ageing process. Irreversible damage is done if your wine is kept at over 28°C (82°F) for even a month.

At 12°C, (55°F) wines age so slowly and develop such fantastic complexity that you will never have to worry about them.

Don't store a bottle of sparkling wine (Champagne in some parts of France) in your fridge for that special day. When that day arrives, there may not be much to celebrate with. Keep the bubbly in the fridge for a day or two but no longer. After that and you should take it out of the fridge and put it back in your cellar.

If you have good constancy of temperature, then the next factor to worry about is the coolness of that temperature. Ideal cellars are at temperatures in the low teens - around 11-14°C. In northern Australia, a cellar may have quite a constant temperature year in, year out; however, it will be quite warm. If wine is stored in a constant temperature but a warm one, then it will age faster than a cooler condition. However, after a few years, the fruity richness in wine disappears more quickly than the tannin and acid softens - a separation of the ageing process takes place. That is why warm stored whites are oily and toasty but have no freshness, and reds taste a bit like Port - they have a soft, hot, dull alcoholic character. Wines should not be stored for more than 2-3 years at temperatures above 20°C. This means that in warm parts of Australia, air conditioning is required. Remember, however, that it is only an issue if you wish to store wine for greater than this length of time.

How to pick a temperature damaged wine

One dead giveaway of heat damage is colour. A brick red brown colour, especially in a young wine, can be an indicator of oxidation damage due to heat. Since Sherry is an oxidised wine, another indicator of heat damage in wines is a sherry-like taste.