ageablility. how long can wine keep?

[wyntheef]

my limited reading suggests (at least as far as kits go) that the less water needed to re-hydrate, the longer the shelf life.
when considering what wine to make, how much of the decision is based on
this? i keep thinking i could end up with more than i can store.
of course, it would depend on how fast one would drink. so does it really even matter? practically speaking?
does it have any bearing on what you continue to ferment? and what is a realistic shelf life for a kit wine anyways? 1 yr? 2?

 

[Wade E]

I dont think its a matter of how much water that much, its more a matter of how much alc and tannins there is, how good of cellar conditions you have and how good of a cprk you use. there are still other factors like good S02 additions and proper ph and ta. As you can see there are so many fatcors to take into consideration of a wine keeping good in your cellar that it boggles the mind.

 

[upper]

Tannins

Care to elaborate on the Tannin Go-Go? Upper

 

[arcticsid]

Was kinda wondering something similar. How do they find these wines that are 50 plus yrs old and they are still good and some say great. This is long before we understood proper storing techniques and all the additives we now know are important.

 

[Malkore]

I have some 10 year old meads that i never sulfited or sorbated, and they've stood the test of time.

Simple meads too, no tannins added, though one was a raspberry melomel so I'm sure the skin of the berry has some tannin content.

 

[Wade E]

Honey in itself is a natural preservative and never goes bad, it will crystalize but a simple warming up will bring it rigt back to its original form. Some of these wines that are 50 years old are good, and some are just worth lots of money because they are so old. there was a story a few years back about a bottle that was hidden and made by someone famous and was auctioned off at a final tally to the tune of around $500,000 and it turned out to be rancid. there have been wines that have stood the test of time though as long or longer that have bee awesome from what Ive heard through articles. mostly reds like Bordeaux's but a few white wines, mostly ones most of us have never even heard of but champagnes are the biggest hit as they have the carbonation to keep them preserved.

 

[deboard]

I wonder about aging, especially since I'm new to both wine making and drinking! A while back I searched google for "aging potential of wine", and these three links came up that I thought were helpful.

http://www.musingsonthevine.com/tips_age.shtml
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aging_of_wine
http://www.thewinecurators.com/vntgChart.html