So you have had that great California Cab laying down for 10 years, just like the salesman told you to do.

The big day arrives – your birthday, say – and you uncork it to blissful expectation. But it’s tinged brown and smells sort of musty, a birthday bust.

We’ve all had it happen, whether the cork goes bad, the wine got too hot or was just simply defective. Who knew wine could expire?

But they do. Wines without added sulfites have a shelf life of two years. New World wines – California, Argentina, New Zealand and the like – typically hold for less than 10 years.

Wines with alcohol content above 13 percent, which includes most California bottles, are best drunk at 5 years, says local wine expert Alan Cuenca, who offers classes in wine education around town as well as owning Put a Cork in It, recently relocated to the Natural Grocer’s building.

Because of its high sugar content, California wines often make better cocktail wines, while more streamlined European wines go better with food.

Cuenca considers only wines from France and Italy truly able to age, and some can stay in the bottle for decades. But even so, the longer you wait to drink a wine, the more likely the cork will fail or bacteria will begin to grow, ruining the bottle.

So you heard it here – drink up!