Open It Now, or Give It a Year? How to Read a Wine's Drink Window

You have a good bottle of red on the counter and nowhere to be. Maybe it came off an LCBO shelf. Maybe it arrived in your WineClub box. Either way the question is the same: is tonight the night, or is this one meant for later?

We put that question to a Niagara winemaker, and his answer was the clearest one we've heard. It also changes how you read the little line on a tasting card that says when to drink a wine.

The short answer: ready is a range

A wine doesn't cross a line from "not ready" to "ready." Most bottles are good the day you open them. A few reds, the firm and structured ones, taste even better after a year or two. So the useful question isn't "is it ready?" It's "how much more would time add?"

That is what a drink window tells you. Once you can read one, you stop guessing.

What time actually changes

In general, white and sparkling wines are made for their fresh fruit and lift, which is why most are opened soon after release. Reds are different. A young red has two things you can pick out on their own: tannin and oak.

Tannin is the grip. It's the drying feeling on your gums and the insides of your cheeks. Oak is the cedar and spice the barrel adds. Give a structured red a year or two and, in most cases, the two settle into each other. Nothing was wrong with the wine on day one. It just tastes more put together later.

(To cellar a wine just means to keep it somewhere cool and dark and open it later. You don't need an actual cellar.)

What a Niagara winemaker told us

For our October box we featured Palatine Hills Estate Winery in Niagara-on-the-Lake. The Neufeld family has farmed there since 1972, and head winemaker Vadim Chelekhov was studying to become an anesthesiologist at Western University before wine took over. He started making it as a hobby at fourteen and has done it for a living since 2011.

We asked him which bottle members should open first. He picked the 2021 Overtime Merlot and described it as both approachable now and rewarding to cellar. That is the whole lesson in a line: approachable now, rewarding later. He doesn't treat those as two different wines, and neither should you.

How to read the window on your card

Our tasting cards carry one short line about timing. They read something like this:

• Ready to enjoy now. Open it whenever you like. This is the wine at its best, or close to it.
• Enjoy now through 2027. Open it soon. The year is the outer edge of the window, and the wine is good the whole way there.
• Enjoy now, better in a year or two. It's lovely tonight, and a little time will round it out. If you open it tonight, you aren't making a mistake.

Every line leads with the same news: this wine is good now. Time is a bonus.

Try it with the one bottle you have

You can check all of this tonight, with the expert beside you. Our tasting cards are written by a panel of Canadian wine experts, and each one names what they found in the glass. So treat the card as a scavenger hunt.

1. Open the red and serve it a little cooler than a warm kitchen. The reds in our October box are served at 16 to 18 °C, the Chardonnay at 10 to 12 °C, and the sparkling at 6 to 8 °C. Your card prints the number for your wine.
2. Taste first, read second. Take two sips and jot down what you find. Then read the card and count how many of its flavours you caught. For the 2021 Overtime Cabernet Sauvignon, the card names blackcurrant, cedar and oak spice.
3. Find the grip. That dry feeling on your gums is tannin, and it is a big part of what "firm" means on a card. It's also the part a year or two softens.

You don't need a second bottle for this. If your red is still firm tonight, you've tasted exactly what time works on, and the window on your card tells you how much more it helps.

If you want to keep a bottle anyway

Some people love watching a wine change, and a card that says "better in a year or two" is an invitation to try. Lay the bottle on its side in the coolest, darkest spot you have, away from the stove and the sunny window. Write the date on the label. Then open it next autumn and compare it with what you wrote down tonight.

Questions we get about drink windows

Does every red get better with age?

No. Plenty of reds are made to be enjoyed within a few years of release. The ones that tend to improve have firm tannin and real structure. When you aren't sure, check the producer's notes or the line on your card.

Is it a mistake to open a red young?

No. It will usually taste firmer and a bit more tightly wound than it will later. If you like that grip with a steak or a hard cheese, tonight is a fine night.

Where do I find the drink window?

On the tasting card that comes in your box. For any other bottle, the winery's website or the back label is the next place to look.

One more bottle to try

Every month, WineClub ships a box from one Canadian winery, each with tasting cards like these. If you'd like to taste along, see how our Canadian wine subscription works. Or take a look at our VQA wines and open one tonight.