50 year old wine bottle opened with a feather

[ricky s]

I was in a restaurant yesterday, a party at one table, apparently they ordered a 50 year old bottle of wine, I was amazed how they open this bottle. I might add this was not my own table, but it was great entertainment, opened it with a feather, any one else seen this before??

there is more to the story, but interested if this has been seen before, probably has by the few better off guys here, but fun to watch. I will enlighten you all if no one comes up with the answer.

 

[Stratman]

A feather and tongs

 

[stwat]

And a glass of water.

 

[Charles Morgan]

The oldest bottle I've opened was 68 years old at the time, staggeringly easy as the cork fell into the bottle when the capsule was removed, it having dried out so much it shrank.

Never seen a feather, normally older bottles are opened with an Ah So, an utter bugger to use.

 

[BTB 500]

Googled it - interesting!

 

[Charles Morgan]

Googling answers the question.

In this case, a quill (pen) is as mighty as a sword - which wine is that used on?

 

[ricky s]

I need to get out more often, you guys got it.

The waiter came out with gloves and a heated set of tongs. applied the tongs to the lower throat of the bottle just below the cork, for about a 30 seconds, put them down, picked a long quill feather, dunked it in a cold water jug, and wiped it in to the heated cut area, the neck just snapped away, 1 de corked bottle! it really was interesting and fun to to see.

The waiter was telling the un educated me, later, that corks of this age, as you guys imply, are really troublesome to removing, the more expensive the wine, the more trouble to be taken to drink it, but not seen this before.

This forum is definitely an education

Just to add, Charles, not sure what the wine was, albeit a red, but it was £1400, something I personally will not be drinking I'm afraid, but given your culinary tastes and experiences, I am sure you have tasted such wonderful delights.

 

[markjay]

I didn't know that

[YOUTUBE]8p0-gJF65q8[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Simon_M]

Now that is great - I need to remember this, especially after I spent 2 hours trying to remove a cork from a 40 year old bottle of port at Christmas! Total mess, had to decant it twice and filter it lord know how many times too.

Ruined the experience.

You go to all these posh places Ricky...

S

 

[Charles Morgan]

Despite years of imbibing it I've never seen it done, it's pure showmanship as most people I know don't bother but strain the wine through muslin.

It's a bit like sabrage - opening champagne with a sabre - a technique used by cavalry officers in the dim and distant past. Having seen it done it does tend to the exhibitionist and vulgar.

 

[LTD]

Couldn't agree more Charles.

A crumbled cork will do far less harm than unstrained vintage wine / port.

The plus side is that straining and decanting should lend itself to allowing it time to breathe and relax all it's flavours.

 

[ricky s]

Now that is great - I need to remember this, especially after I spent 2 hours trying to remove a cork from a 40 year old bottle of port at Christmas! Total mess, had to decant it twice and filter it lord know how many times too.

Ruined the experience.

You go to all these posh places Ricky...

S

Problem is S, a set of your commonly garden shears won't do the job here!LOL

R

 

[Charles Morgan]

If I could have all the money I spent on drinking wine back I'd be a lot richer and thinner, but some of the wines consumed were glories beyond all riches, most not. Sadly buying rare old wines is now a game for hedge fund managers, it has all got much too dear.

I think a Taylors Vintage Port from 1912 (when the Titanic went down), a Portugese Muscatel de Setubal from 1916 (the year of the Somme) and a 1945 La Mission Haut Brion (rather obvious year) stick in the memory as pure perfection and historically evocative. At the time they weren't greatly expensive either!

 

[StuartK]

If anyone is interested in unusual wines my mate owns a wine sourcing business...

Welcome to Rosso Bianco Wines

 

[Stratman]

Now that is great - I need to remember this, especially after I spent 2 hours trying to remove a cork from a 40 year old bottle of port at Christmas! Total mess, had to decant it twice and filter it lord know how many times too.

Ruined the experience.

You go to all these posh places Ricky...

S

Or you could use an 'ah so', so named because it's what people say when they see it used.

The prongs are slid between the cork and bottle, then twisted and pulled. They're used for the same reason as the feather, to avoid damaging a fragile cork.

 

[ChrisEdu]

I too had a 40 year port. I had to filter it twice before decanting, but the result was well worth it - gorgeous! Talking of wine, I had some Canadian ice wine the other day, it was like drinking nectar - delicious.

 

[tanuie]

A few years ago when i used to to a fair bit of scuba diving, a guy i was diving with found a bottle of wine on a shipwreck we were on, i think the ship went down around 1916, any way when we got back from the dive we managed to open the bottle of wine and it was bloody awful.

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

Mrs D would like to know if this technique can be applied to troublesome bottles of Lambrini?

 

[Charles Morgan]

Not a good idea. Port bottles are very strong and thick, the probability of thin glass shattering with loads of lovely glass shards in your wine doesn't bear thinking about.

Personally I think great vintage port is best consumed when at least 80 years old (or within the first ten years for something exuberantly fruity). For vintage ports in between, give them 5 or 6 hours in the decanter for the grape spirit to blow off.

Nowadays I rarely drink port, but the best value ones are the 20 year old tawnies from most good houses or the single vintage Colheita ports (aged in a similar way to multi-vintage blend tawnies - in oak with a lot of oxidative ageing).