The Grapevine

Worth Sharing: Can a Penny Really Save Your Wine?

December 24th, 2015

If you believe everything you read (please don’t), saving a bottle of wine gone bad is as simple as pulling that unwanted penny out of your pocket. Does it really work? [level-members]

A bit of fun for the holiday eve. This meme has been making the rounds this month. We’ve heard it on morning shock-jock radio programs, more serious news programs and, of course, all over the intertubes … the meme is: if you’ve got a bottle of wine that’s been open a bit too long or spent more time on the shelf than it should have, you can rescue the wine by dropping a penny int0 your glass.

Leave it to the geeks at Gizmodo to get all scientific on us and investigate whether this can really be true.

Turns out, it can be. Though not always. The article lays out not only what’s happening chemically and why this will or will not work, depending on the specifics, but also makes the important point that you really, really want to wash the penny first. Don’t rely on the alcohol in the wine to kill anything untoward.

The video is slickly produced but as with so many things on the internet, it oversimplifies. Still, give it a watch, read the accompanying debunking, and share with your wine shop customers. It’s a bit of pretty harmless fun even if it probably won’t get most turned wines to turn back around.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

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