58 June 2012

Stored value

Keeping wine under idealconditions is a challenge,warns Aloysius Tse

W ine, like any organic substance, changes with time. Unlike fresh food items from the market, it

does not deteriorate with time but improves with age. With its increasing popularity, more emphasis has now been placed on how to store wine to bring out the most desirable qualities from bottle maturation.

Most wine made today is ready to drink within 12 months or less of being bottled. Most inexpensive wines – especially the less complex whites and rosés and most light-bod-ied, low-tannin reds such as Beaujolais and simple Pinot Noirs – are at their best when young. These are consumed early for their freshness and fruitiness.

Most of the great whites and almost all the best reds require ageing. If consumed too young, they tend to be acidic, astringent and unpleasant. Adequate storage time will help develop the complex interaction between the primary grape aromas and the secondary flavours from fermentation and oak bar-rel ageing. This complex flavour is often described as the “bouquet” of a wine.

Wine can only be stored if there is an effec-tive and appropriate stopper. A closure must protect the wine from harmful elements until it is consumed. There are three types of stoppers:• Thetraditionalcorkwhich,whenincontact

with chlorine and mould, will develop the unpleasant damp cardboard-like musti-ness caused by a chemical called 2,4,6-tri-choloroanisole. It has been the experience of winemakers that 5 to 8 percent of wine will develop this unpleasant taste, com-monly referred to as “corked” wine.

• Syntheticcorks,usuallymadefromplastic,have become popular, particularly with winemakers in the New World. However,

After hours

synthetic corks are unsuitable for longer periods of storage as they offer insufficient protection against oxygen. (Wines tend to oxidize rapidly.)

• ThecapscrewisusedbyproducersinAus-tralia and New Zealand. Cap screws are most common for aromatic wines such as Riesling and Sauvignon Blanc or simplefruityredssuchasShirazandPinotNoir.Whether cap screws are suitable for full-bodied reds is still being debated and it is unlikely that we will know the answer for decades. While cap screws help to get around the problem of cork taints, they deprive wine lovers of the pleasure of smelling the cork after it’s been pulled.

There is nothing mysterious or difficult about storing wine. Wine is relatively sensi-tive to storage conditions, and it is one of the very few products that can improve with age. Once the wine is firmly stoppered in a bottle, it should be protected from any contact with oxygen, the culprit responsible for the major-ity of mould. The cork should also not be allowed to dry out and shrink to let in oxygen.

Given high property prices in Hong Kong, few people can afford to have a wine cellar at home, so it has become quite common to have wine stored by professionals able to monitor your stock and advise you when to consume each bottle. The main challenge is to find a wine merchant who is reliable and who charges reasonable fees.

Wine collectors who do not want to pay for professionalstoragehavetoimprovize.Some

may want to store their wine in temperature and humidity controlled wine coolers that are available in various shapes and sizes. For someone who has sufficient space at home, building a cellar from scratch, either by exca-vating a new basement or heavily insulating an existing room, is an expensive alternative.

Wine deteriorates rapidly if kept too hot or exposed to strong sunlight, while wild tem-perature fluctuations can damage the stop-per. Therefore, it is important that the bottle be kept away from strong direct light and temperatures exceeding 25 degrees Celsius. For long term storage, the temperature for all wines should be cool and consistent, prefer-ably between 10 and 15 degrees Celsius, as extremes of cold and heat can cause damage. Somedegreeofhumidity ispreferableto

keep the cork moist and oxygen out. If wine is stored in too dry an atmosphere for a pro-longed period of time, the cork can dry out and will no longer be an effective seal. Although damp storage conditions can be good for the condition of the wine, they can cause serious damage to the labels.

Bottles are best kept lying horizontally in a wine rack. This enables easy extraction and identification. Lastly, a maturing wine should be kept in a stable condition. It is essential that ageing time should be spent unagitated and undisturbed.

Aloysius Tse is chairman of Bacchus Fine Wines (Asia) Limited and a past president of the Hong Kong Institute of CPAs.

Wine should be stored to protect it from temperature and humidity extremes and variations.

June 2012 59

The German alternative

Reno Ong looks beyond the Swiss frontier to findwatchmaking excellence

Af

ing heritage started as a natural progression from its iron industry, once prominent because of the proximity to mountains, and has since become the region’s core

enterprise.Then there’s the Jura and Three

Lakes, where different historic watch-making towns such as La Chaux-de-

Fonds and Le Locle are located. With a history spanning more than three centuries, these areas have depended heavily on tour-ists visiting museums and other sights of horological

interest, although boutique watchmakers have kept the tradition alive. Also in the region are cities like Biel/Bienne, where Omega, the SwatchGroupandRolexhavea significant portion of their operations.

It is, however, important to realize that the frequent praise heaped on cities like Geneva dis-tracts people from appreciating centres outside Swiss borders.Glashütte, the birthplace of Ger-man watchmaking, is one such centre. Though it only has 5,000 or so inhabitants, the town boasts a proud tradi-tion.Forone,itishometoA.Lange&Söhne,a manufacturer with a 165-year history, which is often placed at the industry apex.

Aside from its technical achievements, A. Lange had a hand in developing many design characteristics that now define watches made from the area: the three-quarter Glashütte plate, blued screws and

By itself, the Tus-can region of Italy allegedly

has more examples of Renaissance art than the whole of Spain,and certainly more than other countries. In fact, you can easily make the argument that the city of Flor-ence alone embodies human-ity’s artistic prowess.

In the horological world, watchmaking is to Switzer-land what Renaissance art is to Italy: irreplaceable, celebrated and iconic. AsfortheSwissequivalentofTuscany,vari-ous regions can make their claim to that comparison.

First off there’s Geneva, whose name has become synonymous with haute horol-ogy. (Literally, too: the Hallmark of Geneva, reserved for movements assembled in the Swisscanton,isinternationallyregardedasabenchmark for excellence.) Home to industry giants Patek Philippe, Vacheron Constantin and a host of other illustrious names, Geneva has a manufacturing tradition that’s best manifest by a museum Patek opened in 2001. Affectionately called a “temple to watchmak-ing,” the Patek Philippe Museum houses a comprehensive array of rare timepieces track-ing the progress of an industry largely inter-twined with that of the brand and the region.

Vallée de Joux, in the canton of Vaud, is anothercandidateforthetitleof“SwissTus-cany.” Nestled in the Jura Mountains, this scenic area accounts for more than 20 watch factories, among them Audemars Piguet and Jaeger-LeCoultre. The valley’s watchmak-

screwed gold chatons, among other things. Another interesting feature about A. Lange watches is that words on them are often writ-ten in German. In the Datograph series, for example, you get this linguistic difference with the month and the day of the week. A minor detail, but a refreshing one for collec-tors accustomed to reading French or Eng-lish on their watches.

Another manufacturer, Glashütte Origi-nal, was formed out of a watchmak-ing conglomerate that once included A. Lange, so the two share a similar

heritage. As such, Glashütte Origi-nal productions have many of

the technological innovations present in A. Lange watches,

like the swan-neck fine adjustment. Aesthetically, Glashütte Original’s time-pieces also exhibit many of

the design features found in the older company’s products.

But when it comes to regional pride, the Senator Meissen is astandout example from Glashütte Original. Though it has a simple white dial with Roman numerals, this watch involves a high level of craftsmanship, and not just

because of its dependable hour-minute cali-bre. The dial, made of porcelain, is meticu-lously painted and finished by artisans at Meissen, a renowned porcelain company in theeasternstateofSaxony,whereGlashütteis located. Two crossed swords in blue, the Meissen logo, are marked below the watch hands on the dial, a subtle hallmark of an outstanding timepiece you can’t find any-whereelse–notevenSwitzerland.

The Glashütte Original Senator Meissen

The A. Lange & Söhne Datograph Perpetual