The Perlage System For Champagne By The Glass

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed)
Nov 9th 2008 at 2:03PM

How do you preserve an open bottle of sparkling wine? The silver spoon trick? A champagne stopper? A little foil hat? I've tried all of those and more with varying results so I'm intrigued by the Perlage system which promises to preserve open bottles of sparkling wine for weeks "with no loss of quality, taste or effervescence." It works by returning the headspace of the opened bottle to exactly the same composition and pressure of gasses that existed before the bottle was opened by first taking out the oxygen and then repressurizing with carbon dioxide. A bottle is place in the Perlage enclosure, air is taken out and it is resealed and pressurized with carbon dioxide. When you need another glass you can pour from the bottle while it is still inside the safety shell. The Perlage System comes in two versions a commercial one designed for restaurants and bars that can be connected to their existing CO2 systems or one for home use with disposable CO2 cartridges. It sells for $295 for the home version and is in use in over 1,000 restaurants worldwide so far.

Tags: champagne, perlage, sparkling wine, SparklingWine, stopper