Ah-So

A wine opener often used by sommeliers to remove corks that have begun to crumble, as with very old wines. The device does not penetrate the cork, but instead two flat, metal blades are inserted down the sides of the cork and then the device is gently twisted while pulling upward, to remove the cork. It was originally named the Magic Cork Extractor and patented in 1879, but it has been called the Ah-So since the 1960s.