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Nagging Question
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Does a Silver Spoon Stop Champagne from Going Flat?Keep your bubbly bubbling |
Does a silver spoon stop champagne from going flat?
Folk wisdom has it that putting the handle of a silver spoon down the neck of a champagne bottle will keep the liquid effervescent. But the spoon is entirely irrelevant to the bubbliness of your sparkler.
Dr. Richard Zare, professor and department chair of chemistry at Stanford University, says that “what’s keeping the champagne bubbly has less to do with the silver spoon and more to do with the temperature of the fridge.” Zare has done numerous studies on the subject since 1994.
The colder a liquid is, the more gas it can hold. As the liquid gets warmer, energy increases and carbon dioxide molecules escape. In Zare’s champagne studies, there was no significant difference in the effervescence of champagnes stored overnight with a silver spoon and those stored without one. The spoon doesn’t hurt, but it doesn’t help either.
What does help, says food scientist Harold McGee, is recorking the bottle. Even though the champagnes in Zare’s studies remained bubbly overnight, they were still losing gas. Champagne has a lot of carbon dioxide to begin with. The best way to preserve that gas is to put a lid on it.
this "trick" was taught to me by a french family many years ago. i was, of course, skeptical. but many bottles of champagne later, i can tell you it works every time.
Who has leftover champagne? But it DOES work with anything carbonated, BUT for me it only works with a sterling silver spoon. Silver plate hasn't done as well for me. Don't care what "scientific opinion" is, the fat is it has worked for me for over fifty years, even when things aren't refrigerated.
If you leave a spoon sticking out the top, doesn't that mean you then have to leave the bottle open? I recork it, but w/one of those closers w/the metal lever at the top - days later it's just like when I first popped the cork....even if the spoon thing works, if you can't seal the bottle, why would you leave it open to absorb fridge odors?
I always keep a bag of 99 cent store balloons in my kitchen junk drawer, and if there just so happens to be any left over champagne I seal the bottle with one. The balloon does inflate a bit, but a week later the champagne still tastes great!