Sediment and decanting Jose Sediment from red wines can taste bitter to many people. This is most likely to be noticed for full red wines with harsh tannins that require some age to soften and that often throw quite a bit of sediment. If the sedimet is fine, it may make the wine somewhat cloudy, and that bothers some people. In the 1800s many wines were somewhat cloudy, but that often was not noticed because wine glbuttes often were colored, heavily cut, enameled, had gold applied, etc.I would say the tolerance for sediment in a wine is likely to vary quite a bit from person to person. Decanting is not the only way to control sediment. If the sediment is rather heavy, just standing the bottle up for a while and then pouring carefully often avoids the sediment, except for the last portion of the wine. A wine basket and careful technique allows pulling the cork and pouring wine without disturbing the sediment. I have even seen a mechanical device that clamps the bottle and slowly tilts it to pour as a crank is turned. I believe such devices were sometimes used in France in the 1800s. There was even a special version that was made for those huge Champagne bottles that can hold 16 or more normal bottles of Champagne. Some of the wine machines that preserve and dispense wine using an inert gas have tap tubes that can be adjusted just above the sediment in the wine to avoid it. 
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