Saturday · six round the backyard table
Half an hour ago that same bottle stood warm and forgotten on the kitchen bench, where it had sat all arvo, and the first car was pulling into the drive. Now the table is set out the back, the sun is still on the deck rail, and the first glass goes round cold. You put the bottle down in the middle of the table.
By the time the mains come off the barbie it is the same wine, fifty minutes older and as warm as the afternoon. A guest cups her glass with her whole hand, drinks half and waves off the top-up. Nobody says anything. You see it anyway.
And an opened bottle cannot be taken back. So it is one or the other: you get up and carry it inside to the fridge while the table waits for you, or the bucket comes out and takes a seat.
The wine is never allowed to stay where the meal is.
Can it stay on the table for the whole dinner? Judge every fix on that.
The bucket was never the wrong idea. It solved the wrong half: it chills the bottle and takes the table hostage.
Cold from the outside has to get through the glass first. A bucket chills the bottle, not the wine, and on a warm evening the air wins from the top down.
Cold that starts inside the wine has no distance to travel. It sits where the wine is — so it travels with the bottle, out the back door and onto the table. That is the whole difference between chilling the outside and holding the inside.
Concretely: a rod of 304 food-grade stainless steel, frozen, dropped into the bottle you already opened. It keeps the wine cold for up to three hours while the bottle stands in the middle of the table. It also takes an already-open bottle to serving temperature in 10 to 15 minutes.
It has a name: the Lindner & Co Wine Cooling Stick.
You do not get up once between the entrée and dessert.
The cold is in the wine, not outside the glass. That is why it holds for up to three hours with the bottle out on the table.
No. The rod stays in the bottle all dinner. The pouring channel runs straight through it, so you pour through the spout with it in place.
It fits standard 750ml bottles, screw caps included. Brushed steel beside the glasses, and it goes in the dishwasher.
A$74.99
Two complete kits. Each kit: 1 chilling rod, 1 pouring spout, 1 stopper.
Get two complete kits →Free shipping Australia-wide · 30-day refund policy
4.8/5357 reviews
Easy to use and cools better than an ice bucket does for us.
Thomas Damstra
Very happy with it! Wine stays cool longer at the table.
Finn Dijkstra
It has stood out there since the first pour in the late sun, and you have not got up once. No bucket, no esky, no run to the fridge.
Keep it on the table →