For someone who travels often for work (or pleasure) and loves wine, a quandary quickly arises: What do you do when you open a bottle of wine, but have to leave again before finishing it? Sure, a day or two might be okay, but what if business takes you away for a week or more? By the time you get back, the wine has spoiled and you’re out however much money you spent on the bottle. You may have gotten a glass or two out of it, but that still leaves half a bottle, which has now turned to vinegar.
You could just drink the whole damn bottle in one sitting. You’ll get a nice buzz and you don’t have to worry about leaving any wine behind. But what about those nice bottles? That $200 California Cabernet demands better treatment than mindlessly chugging it down just because. (If you need some ideas for wines to get, you can check those out here.)
That’s where Coravin comes in. Coravin allows you to get wine out of a bottle without removing the cork, making it easy to pour a glass and not worry about the rest of it spoiling when you have to jet set off to London or Paris for a week. (This only works with wines that have corks — trying it on a twist top would not end well for you or the Coravin.)
The Coravin works easy enough. After attaching a pressurized argon gas capsule to the device, you clamp it around the neck of a wine bottle. Next comes the fun (and surprisingly satisfying) part: You insert a needle through the cork (and the foil) into the bottle. Once you’ve inserted the needle, you simply tilt and pour. Voilà . You’ve got a five-ounce glass of wine ready whenever you want.
Each Coravin comes with two capsules, which in turn yield thirty five-ounce glasses of wine. On average, iy takes between 25 and 30 seconds to pour one glass of wine.
Even if you don’t travel, the Coravin is great for when you have a bunch of wine, but don’t know exactly what you want on a given night. Feeling Chardonnay, but later on decide you want to switch to a Pinot Noir (or perhaps a wine from Sonoma)? No problem.
Coravin’s aren’t cheap, but when you think about all the money you’re saving on not having to throw out a bottle of wine, it becomes more than worth it very quickly. The Model One system retails for $200 while, the Model Two system retails for $300. If you want to go all out, you can get the Wine Lover’s Kit, which retails for $500 and comes with multiple capsules and needles (including a limited edition premium needle that provides a smoother and faster pour), as well as a stand and a carrying case.
Regardless of what you do or where you go (or don’t go), the Coravin gives you the freedom of choice when it comes to your wines. It’s like having it your way at Burger King, but so, so much better.
Feature image courtesy of Coravin/Facebook.
