How to Clean a Decanter

At some point of being a wine enthusiasts, you would indefinitely come in possession of a decanter or two. Let’s face it, decanters are beautiful and with them, wines just come alive and taste do good but when it comes to cleaning them, it can really leave you scratching your head.

There are various ways of cleaning a decanter but of all the method, personally I don’t prefer the method of using dishwashing liquid as we are never certain on whether any residues of the dishwashing liquid is still there after significant rinsing. Therefore, my recommended method of cleaning involved utilizing materials which you can easily find around home and does not involved chemicals.

Using crush ice and warm water is one of my preferred method. This method is highly effective as the crushed ice will easily agitate the inside of the decanter and scrub any stains away. Once the ice has melted, all you need to do is just simply pour the melted ice away.

 Here are the steps to clean using crush ice and warm water

  1. Rinse the decanter with clean warm water to remove any liquid
  2. Top up the Decanter with warm water and leave to steep
  3. Place a handful of crushed ice into the decanter accompanied with half a cup of water
  4. Swirl the solution round slowly in a circular motion and repeat until the stains start lifting
  5. Repeat rinsing with warm water till clean

I would proceed to use this method instead if it involved some old stain in the decanter. We would use vinegar and salt. The vinegar would be a good solution to stubborn old stain.

Here are the steps to clean using vinegar and salt

  1. Rinse the decanter with clean water to remove any excess liquid sitting at the bottom
  2. Fill the decanter with lukewarm water and leave to soak
  3. Pour roughly 1.5cm – 2cm of salt into the decanter accompanied by twice as much white wine vinegar.
  4. Place your hand over the top of the decanter and shake well.
  5. The solution should be changing colour as the stains are lifted and depending on how tough the stains are you may need to repeat this step
  6. Rinse with lots of warm water to ensure the vinegar smells goes away

For those with are more incline to audio and visual, please to find below a video on how to clean a decanter.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9GYZeebhF0

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