Using Inert Gas to Preserve Wine

Not that kind of gas! Being a wine lover often brings lots of wine paraphernalia on birthday's and major holiday's. Everyone thinks, "he might not like this tie, but he likes wine!" I've received wine glass charms, openers, you name it. One interesting gift last Christmas was an inert gas you pump into an opened bottle to help preserve the wine between tipples. Already being a fan of the Vacu-vin, I thought it was at least worth a try.

The gas comes in a whip cream sized bottle with a long straw. The object is to point the straw into the bottle and fill the empty oxygenated space, so the deterioration process slows. With a few short blasts of the gas, loosely cork the bottle with the original cork. Seems simple enough, but did it work?

Much to my chagrin after tasting the wine a few days later, it was awful!! The gas had imparted some of the odor/flavor into the wine itself. It was like drinking wine that had been swirled around a PVC pipe for half hour (not that I've done this). Needless to say I was NOT impressed and it ruined a perfectly good bottle of wine. After speaking with several fellow Wine-O's, I was told to let the gas dissipate for a half hour before drinking. Whether I did it wrong or received an off-brand bottle of this stuff, I am certainly not going to try it again. I'll take my Vacu-vin over this gas any day.

Cheers!