How long is wine supposed to breathe before it is served?
This seemingly simple question is a subject of serious study among the sommelier set. To let a wine “breathe” is to expose it to air. This may change the flavor of a wine, but not necessarily for the better. The theory is that air can mellow the tannic or astringent quality in some types of wines. Typically, age is what mellows these flavors. The only wines that really need to breathe are dry reds that are meant to be aged for many years before serving. If you serve them too young, they’ll need to breathe first to achieve some of the complex flavor that age would have given them. Letting a wine breathe is a poor substitute for aging the wine in the bottle, but it’s the best you can do if you’ve already opened that classic red. If you have a very fine bottle of red that might need to breathe, the safest thing to do is pour a
