What's in a Glass?

Wine glasses come in all shapes and sizes, prices, varieties, and brands. Some are handmade from the finest crystal, others are mass produced. While no glass can turn water into wine—they are an important part of the wine drinking experience.

“Glasses make a huge difference,” says Jeff Miller, a noted Napa Valley winemaker with strong opinions on the subject. “The glass must be totally clear, no etching. It needs to have a thin lip, and the glass shape needs to concentrate the scent of the wine into your nose.”

The basic premise determining the proper shape of a wine glass is simple: a “proper” wine glass should enable a precise flavor profile, and nose, of a particular variety of wine to interact directly with receptors on a person’s tongue and nose at an exact point for optimum enjoyment. Sounds complicated, but basically the job of a wine glass is to make your nose and tongue happy.

The most well known name in wine glassware is Riedel Crystal, produced in Austria. Other companies making fine glasses include Speigelau, Masterpiece, Vindel, and Durand, among others. But there’s a relatively new product on the market that’s looking to revolutionize the industry: the “breathable” wine glass, by a German company called Eisch Glaskultur. And believe it or not—it actually works!

Where to buy Eisch breathable glasses

Weaver Wines

If you don’t believe me, visit Weaver Wines in Downtown Ventura and try for yourself. “We do a demonstration here at our store and the Eisch glasses speak for themselves,” says co-owner Seana-Marie Weaver. “We usually don’t tell the customer what we’re doing; they think it’s just the shape of the glass that affects the smell and taste.”

The Eisch glasses (they make a full line of styles) are made from a special lead-free crystal that has undergone a proprietary oxygenization treatment. Basically, oxygen can go through the glass to aerate the wine quickly. The company claims that wine sitting in an Eisch glass for about four minutes aerates, or breathes, as much as it would over the course of two hours in a decanter.

I recently conducted my own “wine glass tasting,” which anyone can do at home. First, gather up a few friends. Then collect as many sets of wine glasses as possible so each participant will be tasting from the same thing. Be sure all the glasses are clean and dry, and then open a few bottles of red wine. It doesn’t matter what kind, but be sure the wine isn’t corked or bad in any way. Line up the glasses in the same order in front of your tasting participants and you’re ready to begin.

In my test, we used a few Riedel glasses, some beautiful Waterford cut crystal stems, and an assortment of medium to short wine glasses. The new Eisch glasses rounded out the test. The unanimous opinion indicated that the larger, taller wine glasses produced a fuller nose, and thereby a more complex flavor profile than wine poured into shorter, un-tapered glasses. All participants also agreed that the Eisch glass “opened” up the wine quickly and allowed for a softer, rounder expression of the wine than the others. (This was the surprise hit of the tasting!)   

Furthermore, all participants felt that wine glasses with a thinner lip provided a more pleasing “lip-feel” and overall appreciation of the wine. Sadly, my expensive Waterford glasses (an old wedding present) looked great but did little to add to the wine.

Try an experiment like this, and you might be surprised. I can now say without a doubt that I will always request restaurateurs bring out their best wine glasses. Or perhaps suggest they buy some Eisch glasses.