A good part of enjoying wine is enjoying it at the correct temperature. Often this means keeping your whites in your refrigerator and your reds tucked away in a spot out of the sun. If you’re lucky to have a room that’s devoted to housing your wine and the money to invest in creating the correct temperature to maintain those wines, good for you.
For most of us, however, a small wine cooler is our best option between finding space around our other groceries and spending hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars converting a room of our home into a wine cellar. There are a number of wine coolers on the market, and I’ve had a few in my home. They were affordable, typically held 8 bottles of wine, and the motors burned out on them within a month.
Fortunately, the 12 Bottle Wine Cooler from Avalon Bay has held up amazingly, and looks to be the solution to my wine cooling needs.
First, let’s talk design. I own a town-home, one that my wife and I got to add some personal touches to, but one that was by and large going to require any big changes we made to be done after the fact. Because of that, items like adding a wine cooler to our island wasn’t really an option when we built the home, and it’s not something we’re prepared to do now. Because of that, appliances in our home need to be visually appealing because they are going to be seen to some degree. The Avalon Bay 12 Bottle Wine Cooler has a nice, compact, sleek design. If you’re going to install it into a kitchen cabinet I think you’ll appreciate the size, but if you’re like me and it’s going to be sitting out where people can see it, you’ll appreciate the clean lines and simple black and silver colors.
Staying on the exterior, the current temperature is displayed on a digital read out, and the three touch buttons allow you to adjust the temperature up or down a single degree, and to turn on a soft blue interior light, perfect for checking what bottles you have chilling without having to turn on a brighter overhead light.
On the inside you’ll find 4 rows of 3 bottles each, the top three of which can be pulled out for easy access to the wine being held on them. I’ve put a few different wine bottle shapes in there so far, and the only type that was even a little snug (and that not much) was a champagne style bottle that was fatter at the bottom than at the top. Still, so long as you’re sticking to 750ml bottles, you’ll have no problem storing your bottles.
Throw in some adjustable feet to ensure that the cooler is level (or to get it up off carpeting in my case), and an incredibly quiet running fan (seriously, this thing went from 80 to 61 when I first plugged it in without making a noticeable sound), and it’s easy to justify the $120 price tag, on par with what I’ve paid for inferior wine coolers.
You can find the Avalon Bay 12 Bottle Wine Cooler on Amazon or on the Air n Water site. You can also check out my video review on YouTube at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFP54ZdobSw .
Editor’s Note: I received this items as a free sample for review.
