624m wine bottles a year down drain

WE pour away the equivalent of 624million bottles of wine a year, research says.

Many drinkers assume opened wine will not last and throw away whatever is left.

But most bottles will keep for up to five days, providing a stopper or the cork is put back in.

Given the high price of wine, it means that households are wasting huge sums.

Laithwaite’s Wine found that UK households throw away an average of two glasses of wine a week each – adding up to 624million bottles per year.

They also found one in five of us think the remains of a bottle of red, rosé or white wine must be thrown away after just half a day.

As many as one in three wrongly think a bottle of Champagne has lost its fizz and so becomes undrinkable after one to five hours.

some 42 per cent of people surveyed said the reason they pour leftover wine away is because they do not get around to drinking it.

Two in five felt they had left it out of the fridge for too long, 30 per cent said they had forgotten to cork it and 24 per cent said they had opened more than they wanted to drink.

Londoners were the biggest at-home consumers of wine, opening an average of 2.1 bottles every week. And they wasted most too, throwing away an average of five glasses at the end of a social event. one in 50 admitted throwing away the equivalent to two bottles of wine every week.

David Thatcher, of Laithwaite’s, said: ‘The reality is white, red, rosé and good quality sparkling or Champagne can keep for as many as five days.’

The firm advises storing sparkling wine in the fridge with a stopper. reds should be kept in a cool, dark place with a cork, though they could be with a stopper in the fridge. And rosé or white should be re-corked and in the fridge. It said opened bottles should be stored upright to minimise the surface area exposed to oxygen, which can spoil the wine faster.

A gin from Aldi has beaten some of its big-brand rivals in taste tests by experts. oliver Cromwell London Dry Gin – £9.97 for a 70cl bottle – won a silver medal at the International spirits Challenge, beating Beefeater’s £63.35 Burrough’s reserve Gin.