A
Note from Sergio
Taste is subjective.
Which wine is better—white or red? Traditional
or modern? Fruity or lean? Jammy or austere?
Simple or complex? Noble or pedestrian? New
wood, old wood, high acid, low acid? People
follow their palates to all sorts of places.
Quality, however, is not subjective.
And certain conditions improve quality—that’s
a fact. Temperature-controlled wine is better
than non-temperature-controlled wine. Wines
in big bottles are better than their smaller
counterparts. It’s indisputable.
What do I mean by better? I mean: The wine just
tastes better. It ages better; it stays better;
it shows better. A bottle that’s been
sitting around for a few months on a dusty shelf
in an overheated Milan shop is not of the same
quality as a bottle that’s been plucked
from a stone cellar in Toscana. A bottle that
spends its days traveling from country to country
in the humid, fiery hold of a ship is entirely
different from a bottle of the same vintage
that makes its way in the cool cocoon of a refrigerated
crate.
Similarly, the wine you’ll
drink from a large bottle will be a finer wine
than the same vintage poured from a 750 milliliter.
Some of the reasons are logical: there’s
about an inch of air between the cork and the
juice in each bottle, no matter the size; the
ratio of oxygen to wine is therefore lower in
a magnum, and so the wine oxidizes at a slower
rate. It ages well and lasts longer.
In the end, though, air level
can only partially explain why wines in big
bottles are superior. That bit of science can’t
explain the many mysteries, developments, and
explosions that happen inside a bottle or the
essential magic of wine—why it’s
sometimes so glorious. Italians say “Perché
è cosi”—“Because it
is.” But when I’ve pressed the greatest
winemakers in Italy for an answer, they’ve
all concurred: Wine is life, and life flourishes
in a good environment. Simply put: the more
life, the better.
Today I’ve compiled a
list of big bottles for the holiday season;
these wines call for a party, an occasion, a
celebration. Nothing looks more impressive on
a dinner table or makes a more special gift.
And because they’re large bottles that
are stored in our dimly-lit 54 degree facility
(as is 99.5% of our merchandise), they represent
your highest chance of getting wine at its most
pristine. They may not be showing their full
potential today, but for their distinct brand
and vintage, these wines are the finest around.
My best,
Sergio Esposito
To share IWM
with another enthusiast, just click the Tell-A-Friend
link below!
Tell
a Friend about IWM!
