The huge variety of wine glasses out there aren't (entirely) just for show. Learn how to enjoy different The shape and construction of different styles of wine glasses have been designed to make different varieties of wines even more enjoyable.
Photo by longhorndave.
If you watched the mini-documentary on wine we shared with you, Wine for the Confused, you know to be wary of overly snobby attitudes when it comes to wine drinking. The shape of a wine glass isn't so much a point of snobbery, however, as functionality. Wine glass shapes, through trial and error over great spans of time, are crafted to maximize your enjoyment of wine—there's a reason, after all, that wine isn't served in a tankard, even if it would be cheaper for restaurants to manage.
Culinary blog Serious Eats went wine tasting and sampled the same wines in various glasses, from plastic cups to high-end glasses. The results of their taste testing experiment?
We tasted some pretty superb wine in everything from plastic cups to handblown lead crystal. The results were convincing: what you put your wine into matters as much as the wine itself.
Take the 2005 E. Guigal Saint Joseph Syrah as an example. In a plastic cup, this $26 bottle of wine tasted like Welch's grape juice. In a glass specially shaped to accentuate Pinot Noir's aromas and flavors, it tasted very alcoholic and acidic, with a roughness in the mouth that was unpleasant. In a glass Riedel made for Syrah, however, the wine smelled of red and black fruits and chocolate, and was as smooth as satin in your mouth.
They go on to provide advice on purchasing glasses—spend, for example, as much on a single wine glass as you normally spend on a bottle of wine to calibrate your glass quality to your wine quality—and other helpful glass tips. Have some wine-related advice of your own, glass-centric or otherwise? Sound off in the comments below.
Wine and Plastic Cups: Not a Perfect Pairing [via TheKitchn]


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