bottling

Pluralbottlings

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle of bottle.

   The cellar crew is bottling this year's vintage by hand.

   Bottling the cider too early can trap excess fizz.

   Note

   The -ing form carries every sense of the verb, not just the cellar one. In British use it also means feeding an infant formula. In British slang it covers losing one's nerve at the last moment, throwing away a lead, striking someone with a bottle, and pelting a stage act. That last use gives the noun a hostile pelting with bottles. Context decides the sense: a team bottling a lead has nothing to do with wine.

2. 2
   nouncountable

   A batch of liquid bottled together, such as from a single vat, barrel, or one season's growth.

   The 2019 bottling sold out within a month of release.

   Collectors prize early bottlings from the estate's first vineyard.

   Similarbatch, vintage

   Note

   Here the noun counts: a bottling, two bottlings, each a batch with its own identity, much as a vintage has. That separates it from the activity of bottling, which takes no plural. Bottling takes time, but a bottling sells out. The countable sense lets a producer set apart the bottlings from barrel-aged wines with a premium label.

3. 3
   nouncountable

   The act of throwing bottles at a performer or act on stage as a sign of disapproval.

   The new act survived a vicious bottling at the festival's main stage.

   Several bottlings marred the afternoon lineup before security stepped in.

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