Does The Glass Really Matter?

First of all, let me say I’m a wine aficionado. For those of you not into wine you can translate that as, “wine snob”. Yes, I talk about things like tannins, complexity, aging, and many other esoterica. Wine aficionados (my brother Glenn and I in particular) truly enjoy discussing flavors and aromas and finish.  (Just ask our wives.)

I know that a lot of people only recognize two types of wine, good wine, and bad wine.  I can’t deny that is the true bottom line of wine appreciation. It’s where everyone starts, and you really don’t need to go any further to enjoy wine.   

Having said that, those of us who consider ourselves to be “experts” on wine disagree greatly about one thing and that is the significance of wine glasses. Many people make a concerted effort to have the proper wine glass for the proper wine. They discuss the importance of the design of the glass for collecting the aroma and for allowing you to “swirl” the wine so that the aromatics can be released for appreciation. They talk about how the shape of the rim of the glass affects the way the wine is presented to the tongue.

For those who genuinely appreciate these subtleties, I envy you. I have never been able to tell the difference in the flavor or the aroma of wines based on the type of glass. It may be that I’m not as much of an expert as I’d like to think. That’s always a possibility.  (Don’t tell anyone I admitted that. The first rule of wine snobbery is that you are never wrong.)

When we visited Italy, we found that most restaurants where locals dined served wine in glasses that can best be described as juice glasses. Only in the restaurants frequented by tourists did we find stemmed glassware. I think Italians know a thing or two about wine.

My thoughts on wine glasses are not shared by many of my friends, whose opinions I respect. I believe that good wine is good in any glass and bad wine is bad in any glass. I will make an exception here. You should never drink any wine, even bad wine, from a styrofoam cup.

If you drink good wine out of a water glass it will still taste really good. If you drink bad wine in an expensive and appropriately shaped glass it will not be good.

So, what does The Grumpy Doc say? Well, The Grumpy Doc says; “Enjoy your wine and drink it out of whatever glass you have. If it’s good, you will like it no matter what. But remember, wine is best enjoyed with friends. That, not the glass, is what really makes wine good.” 

And that is my grumpy opinion.