Back in May, Alex posted about the Ravi Wine Chiller, and I became intrigued. Because I am a little too fond of wine. Because, short of frantically throwing a last-second bottle into the freezer, I could think of no other way of chilling wine spur of the moment. Would the wine chiller actually work, though?
I threw my wine chiller into the freezer a couple months ago, and then promptly forgot about. That's how easy it is to prep. It basically operates in the same way as your common ice pack. When it caught my eye the other night, as I rooted through the freezer for the veal scallopini I had purchased earlier that day, it occurred to me that a test drive was in order. After all, we have a glass of wine with dinner most nights. Why not that night?
And after slaving in the hot kitchen for hours (I'm a slow cooker), it was time for the wine.
We decided to go with a pinot grigio, rather than a red wine, as is featured in all of the Ravi's promotional materials. I know there was some discussion in the last post about the wrongness of chilling red wine. Actually, red wine should be slightly cooler than room temperature and, for this purpose, the chiller has a small air hole you can put your thumb over in order to control how cold your wine gets as it passes through. The longer the hole is covered, the longer the wine sits in the chiller. Cover the hole for a shorter period of time in order to get the correct, only-slightly-cool effect for red wines.
Anyway.
The chiller pops right onto the top of an open wine bottle quite easily, due to a corkscrew-type base. After that, all you have to do is pour at your preferred speed.
After pouring our wine for the second time (we forgot to cover the air hole the first time, and our pinot was distressingly lukewarm), our was was thoroughly, magically chilled, and I got thoroughly soused while watching CSI for hours on end. Nifty!
[$49.95, Wine Enthusiast]
Related: Happy Hour: Ravi Wine Chiller