The phrase comes from a Europe before central heating, where the room in question sat at fifteen to eighteen degrees. An Australian living room in February is twenty-six. Serving a big red at Australian room temperature isn't following the tradition — it's doing something the tradition never imagined, and it's the most common reason a good bottle drinks worse at home than it did at the cellar door.

In this episode:

• Why warmth costs you aroma — ethanol's vapour pressure roughly doubles between fifteen and twenty degrees, and that alcohol vapour masks everything underneath it

• Why a warm red smells "hot" and the fruit seems to vanish (it hasn't)

• The tannin question, answered honestly: some research says cold tightens tannin, other work finds chilling slightly reduces astringency. The effects are small and nobody should state it as settled

• Why an over-chilled white seems to improve halfway through the glass

• Serving ranges by style, from sparkling at six to eight degrees up to full reds at fifteen to eighteen

• The most over-chilled category in the country, and it's probably in your fridge right now

• The two rules that fix almost everything: twenty minutes in, fifteen minutes out

• Why an ice bucket beats a freezer, and what a couple of tablespoons of salt does

• The glass problem — and what the stem is actually for

The one wine improvement that costs nothing, needs no equipment, and matters just as much on a fourteen dollar bottle as a hundred and forty dollar one.

https://australianwinemagazine.com.au

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Temperature ranges are conventional guidance and preferences vary between people, styles and individual wines. Chilling times depend on the starting temperature, the appliance and the conditions, so treat them as approximate. Please drink responsibly.