Anya Hawkins's blog : Tips to Reduce Wine Wastage

If you enjoy a glass of wine in the evening, but no one else in your family shares your taste, you might find you end up wasting lots of wine. This is a real shame as wine can be very expensive to purchase; throwing it down the sink is the last thing you want to do when you’ve spent time choosing the perfect bottle. In this article, we take a look at some tips to reduce your wine wastage.

Replace the cork

Once you’ve poured yourself a glass of wine, you should replace the cork the same way it came out. This will help to stop more oxygen from getting to the wine, which will speed up the process of the wine spoiling. If you struggle to get the cork back in or often lose the cork, then consider buying a wine stopper, you can put this in the top of the bottle to help keep the wine fresher for longer.

Get your friends round

A bottle of wine is made for sharing; when you want to indulge in your favourite wine, invite over some friends to join you. You can make an evening of it socialising and enjoying spending quality time with your close friends. Plus, you’re unlikely to waste any wine when you are all drinking from the same bottle. Just remember to tell your friends that you’ll be supplying the wine for this evening, and they can reciprocate in the future.

Cook with the wine

If you’re making a delicious meal, it can be enhanced by adding wine to the process. This is a great way to use up a small amount of leftover wine and reduce your overall wine wastage. Even if you’re not cooking at this time, you can create a stock with wine and freeze it to be used at a later date. Alternatively, you can place wine in ice cube trays and freeze it; these ice cubes can then be defrosted and used in cooking at a later date. This is perfect if you enjoy cooking with wine but don’t often have a bottle of wine open to add to your dishes.

Put it in the fridge

When a wine has been opened, the cooler temperature of the fridge stops it from going off as quickly; this is the case with all wines, even red Dominus wine. Just make sure if you refrigerate red wine, you allow it to come back to room temperature again before pouring yourself a glass. This will ensure the wine retains its full flavour and isn’t too cold for drinking.

Drink the wine

One of the easiest ways to reduce your wine wastage is to drink the wine rather than leave it to go off. However, this is often easier said than done; there might be occasions when you only fancy a small glass because you have plans the next day. If this is the case, consider saving your best bottles of wine for occasions where you can drink more than one glass or have several evenings to enjoy wine in a row. This is why many people choose to open a bottle of wine on a Friday night; any leftovers can be enjoyed on Saturday evening before they need to go back to work on Monday.

Poor smaller glasses

Another way wine is often wasted is when you pour a large glass and don’t end up finishing the entire amount. If it's white wine, the temperature can quickly heat up, and the wine won’t be as enjoyable. To prevent this type of wastage, you can use smaller glasses and only pour the amount of wine you think you’ll drink. You can always go back and pour yourself more if needed once you’ve finished what you have in your glass.

Wine shouldn’t be wasted; lots of time and effort goes into making each bottle; therefore, it deserves to be enjoyed. By following these tips, you can reduce the amount of wine you throw away. Remember to replace the cork, invite over your friends, add some to your cooking, keep open wine in the fridge, drink it when you can and pour smaller glasses to avoid wastage.