Wine Openers
posted by alesha in Wine
You just came home from a long day at work. The kids are fast asleep. Now it’s time for to relax with a nice glass of wine, like Wolf Blass Cabernet Sauvignon Black Label. You go to the kitchen drawer, extract your wine opener and raise it to the bottle. After you attempt to open the wine, the unthinkable happens… the cork breaks!
How many times has this happened to you? Again, you are screaming at the wine opener, as you place it back into the bottle for a second attempt. You are now at a crossroads: pray you can get that sucker out in one piece or start thinking of grand excuses why the wine has cork pieces swimming in it. How embarrassing…
Waiters and waitresses make it seem so easy - it must be since they practice so much. Well, I have been drinking and opening wine for roughly 10 years now, and I still can’t seem to stop breaking a few corks every now and then. Thus, I have decided my troubles are the fault of my wine opener. I have several in my kitchen, but I still haven’t found one that I can truly depend on. I’ve got the $1 liquor store plastic wonder, the cheap wing corkscrew opener ($5-$7), the Waiter’s corkscrew ($5-$10), and the two-prong corkscrew ($10-$12 - though quite helpful in extracting already broken corks but are quite difficult to use). The only one not in my collection is the most expensive opener - the Rabbit ($50+). My fear is that if I spend a lot on an expensive wine opener, it will fail me just the same as the others and I’ll just be out more money. So, what’s the best opener? Do I pay for what I get, or is there a compromise?
I have heard two sides of this story. The first side claims that all wine openers are the same and I need to just slow down and take my time. The second side claims that if you really are a true wine lover, a good opener is imperative no matter what the cost.
So I must know – is The Rabbit the answer to my troubles? What do you fellow Snoothers find works best? If you do have The Rabbit(or openers with similar designs), what are the positives and negatives. I’d love to solve my wine opening dilemma before it’s time to open the next bottle.
I’ve got a cheaper version of The Rabbit and I never have a problem with it. Before getting that opener, my problem was less the broken cork and more the muscle power. I could get a cork about 1/4 of the way out and then the negative pressure in the bottle thwarts me.
time to go back to the gym i guess?
I use a basic lever corkscrew (I believe its the ‘waiters friend’ type) and it’s served me well, although at the wine messenger we’d basically wear them out, opening 2,000 bottles or so a year.
The other type that is worth having around, particularly for cork collectors or for getting a crumbly cork out, is the amusingly named Ah-So corkscrew. Basically, 2 prongs which slide around the cork and pull it out intact.
They look unique and people who’ve never seen them are sure to doubt of their utility, but they are a very good backup.
I was gifted a Rabbit at some point and I have to say I only use it when I really want to spoil myself. They’re so easy to use it makes it seem like I’m cheating — right down to the point where it grabs onto the cork to pull it off the corkscrew after you’ve already extracted it from the bottle…
First of all, I think one of the two famous devices has to give up the name “The Rabbit” because the overlap is disconcerting and uncomfortable, especially since I’m about to talk about my parents. That aside, my folks have a Rabbit and it’s awesome. But it does feel like cheating.
They also have a neighbor (not a new kind of corkscrew - the “person” kind of neighbor) who is some sort of big shot in an international corkscrew collectors club. This is a real thing. They apparently have a convention once or twice a year in different parts of the world - they just came back from Australia for the yearly show out there. Must be nice.
Ditch the Rabbit!!
Get a waiter’s Pulltap. Had one for five years with no breakage.
Best,
Charles Smith
Charles - thats what i use. As long as you get a semi-decent one (ie. not $2 disposable kind) it’ll last a few thousand bottles for sure.
The key for these is to get the hinged lever one to minimize your heaving, and to get one with a good worm. Good means that it follows the thread shape, not the kind that the point centers. Those are for drilling our a bore hole!
Hmm… sounds like I need to wish list a good wine opener along with my favorite wines.
Without a doubt the waiters friend pulltap type of corkscrew is the best. It’s simple, small and easy to use. Try puting yor rabbit into pocket
I only use pulltaps in my work and to open my own wines. Sometimes I get the broken cork but it’s not a problem to take out the rest of broken cork from bottle with pulltaps, and with rabbit it can be kind of tricky. Oh, and the neighbor mentioned by Clint is really the Real Thing, but only for conservative professionals!