Underwater Wine Aging is a New Trend in Europe

Underwater wine
Photo by Mathilde Langevin on Unsplash

European winemakers are all over this trend right now: underwater wine. Apparently, this new method is supposed to make the wine taste better. Experts agree that this can be true, and it all started accidentally. Here’s how it all went down, and while they believe it could do wonders for the wine.

A Happy Accident

In 2010, some Veuve Clicquot Champagne from 1825-1930 was found in the Åland archipelago in Finland. It accidentally spent almost 200 years underwater, and the wine turned out to be excellent. Not only it tasted great, but it was fresh, sweet, and had an amazing color.

It didn’t take long for the winemakers to start doing this on purpose. The wine-making industry didn’t have any innovations for a very long time, so people around France, Spain, and Croatia promptly started storing wine underwater.

Since not enough time has passed for underwater wine aging to show legit results, it’s still mostly seen as a marketing ploy to get people to pay premium prices for novelty.

While the process of underwater wine aging sounds pretty easy and straightforward, that’s not exactly the case. It takes a lot of money and a will to risk ruining a perfectly good batch. The goal is to store wine in the dark, which means beyond 650 feet underwater. A standard wine bottle, however, typically implodes under pressure after the first 80 feet.