Step By Step Guide to Opening a Wine Bottle

Whether you're tasting or drinking wine purely for enjoyment, it is extremely important for a real wine lover and expert to know how to correctly open a bottle of wine. The following is a simple step-by-step guide that will impress your date or your friends and make you look like a real sommelier.

Step 1: Be sure to surround yourself with the proper props: the basic corkscrew design should have a generous helix - one that can slide a matchstick up and down. That will stop the corkscrew from tearing the heart off the cork. Corkscrews with a solid core and sharp edges do not grip well and increase the risk of boring a hole through the cork. Be careful not to cut yourself with the blade.

Step 2: To open the wine, use the broad part of the knife blade on the corkscrew to cut the foil or plastic at the lower lip of the bottle neck, to ensure a clean, more uniform cut. The foil or cap is sometimes removed by pulling an extended, perforated metal strip, or plastic "zipper" provided on the bottle. The bottle lip should be wiped with the moistened end of a napkin, if necessary, to remove any encrusted dirt.

Step 3: Close the blade and open the spiral, or "worm," of the corkscrew. Holding the corkscrew at an angle, place it in the center of the cork, or slightly off-center, then give a little twist around until it's gone right into the cork and then simply pull it out. If the corkscrew plunges into the bottle, it is a sign that the closure was not airtight and the wine might be spoiled.

Step 4 : Make sure that the cork is moist at one end, ensuring that the wine has been stored properly. Corks may also have crystals on their moist end. These crystals do not indicate a faulty wine and do not affect its flavor.

Step 5: Wipe the mouth of the bottle with the moist end of a napkin.

Step 6: Serve the wine to the right side of your guest or date. Pour it gently and fill less than half of a glass, so that you have enough room to swirl the wine around if you need or want to.

Step 7: Pour a glass for yourself and enjoy! Tip: What to do when there are floating cork chips in the wine? Don't worry, bits of cork floating in the wine are almost always harmless and seldom indicate a fault. Remove, and taste to confirm that the wine is not off.