What to do with Leftover Wine
Friday January 9, 2009
Whether you have leftover wine from dinner or from a larger get together, the question comes up - what to do with the wine, when finishing it isn't necessarily your best bet? When it comes to leftover wine, you've got several options: keep it, pitch it, or "recycle it." Read more...
Comments
I usually don’t have much problem with finding occasion to just drink my leftover wine with dinner the next evening. (Often I will even plan a menu ahead of time to go well with any possible vino leftovers from the night before.) However, when that’s not really an option, I usually can find occasion to cook with it.
Full-bodied reds like merlot or cabernet sauvignon make wonderful bases for sauces or glazes meant to go with roasts or roasts, and they add zip to red sauces for pasta as well. When I have a little extra white wine leftover, it’s all about the seafood. I have a wonderful go-to recipe for crab pasta with pinto grigio sauce. Mussels and clams are wonderful with a little sauvignon blanc or dry riesling, but the ubiquitous chardonnay will work, too, of course. Add some capers and maybe a little fresh parsley and you’ve got some serious comfort food on your hands.
I agree with your assessment of the great majority of the decorative seals out there on the market. They’re an attractive way to re-cork the wine while it’s still on the table, but they don’t adequately protect the wine from oxidation overnight. I think the original cork from the bottle makes for a decent fit as far as keeping the wine fresh overnight, but if we’re talking about needing to keep it fresh longer than that, then I prefer a self-sealing stopper for sure.