A wine fridge takes the guesswork out of bottle storage, but it's not a necessity. The home has plenty of safe places to keep wine, but it also has danger zones that can quickly lay waste to your bottles of red, white and sparkling.
A great bottle of wine is only as great as the environment it calls home. We tend to know the basics -- no direct sunlight, somewhere cool and dry -- but there's a chance you're making a few storage mistakes without even knowing it.
To help sort out what your reds, whites, and sparkling wines actually need to stay in peak condition, I spoke with two people who know their way around a cellar: Liz Martinez, general manager and sommelier at Centrolina in Washington, DC; and Beki Miller, advanced sommelier and beverage manager at Caramá by Wolfgang Puck in Las Vegas.
Here's what they want every wine lover to know about storing bottles properly.
1. On top of the fridge
The heat emitted from the top of your fridge can decimate wine in just a few days. Joey Kotfica/Getty Images
While you may have ample space to line or stack bottles on top of your fridge, it's far from ideal.
"Refrigerators give off heat and vibrate constantly, both of which accelerate aging and degrade quality," explains Miller. "You don't need specialized equipment to store wine well. You just need the least bad option."
"My go-to solution is simple: boxes of wine on the floor of an interior closet, with the bottles stored on their sides," she says. "This keeps the cork from drying out and protects the wine from light and vibration. I also store wine in a box under the bed, which offers a dark, quiet and relatively stable environment without taking up valuable space."
2. In fact, most of the kitchen is off limits
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