Glass Houses

Wow, what a whirlwind two weeks. It's brought good news and bad news. Let's get the bad out of the way, our next Wine from A to Zin night has been postponed from February 16th till sometime in March or April. The good news, we need to postpone it to move into our new house! Well, it's not ours till the closing on March 1st, but you get the idea. Katie and I are moving to Uncasville and can not wait to hold some amazing wine tastings in our spacious new living room and dining room. Not to mention the gorgeous kitchen (with a double oven!). We'll keep everyone up to date as to when the new date will be. And it should definitely be more comfortable in larger space. Ok, so that clears up the second half of the title, as to the first part. Riedel, the leader in glassware around the world, has developed a new glass. They have created a glass just for Oregon Pinot Noir. Now, Riedel has been marketing glasses for specific varietals for years now. And I'll admit, it seems silly. Your telling me that the shape and size of your glass will affect your wine? After three years of heavy wine drinking (always in moderation of course) I can say that these factors do affect the aroma and flavor. Does that mean you should go drop a grand on new stems for every type of wine you drink? No, how many of us can afford a set of four glasses at $75 each just for Zinfandel? Using the wrong glass won't make your Sauvignon Blanc taste like piss (that just means its bad wine) but typically the right glass will optimize the aroma and flavor. For example, last night at The Up River Cafe, they gave us small white wine glasses for a bottle of Petit Sirah. So I kindly requested their larger red glasses, seeing as they were more appropriate for the wine. Back to Riedel, they have made glasses for specific regions from Europe, however this is their first Regional and Varietal specific glass for an American wine. It all came about when some organizers of a Pinot Noir event in Oregon discussed using one Riedel glass for the event. They narrowed the choice down to two styles. And while one enhanced the aroma more effectively, the other enhanced the flavor. So the good folks in Austria tinkered in their factory till they created a perfect combination of the two glasses. Harvey Steiman at Wine Spectator blogged about where this might lead, a specific glass for almost any region and wine? Maybe someday, but my wallet prefers the Riedel series available at your local Target for $10 a stem. Anyway, I'll update later today perhaps with some wines we've had over the last weeks, including a Beringer wine dinner at The Octagon in Mystic. Till next time..."To take wine into our mouths is to savor a droplet of the river of human history."--Clifton Fadiman, American writer and critic