🍷 Wine glass

A wine glass is a glass bowl on a stem. It is made for drinking wine and catching its aroma. The stem lets you hold the glass without warming the wine with your hand. The bowl gathers the smells and directs them to the nose.

The shape of the glass is matched to the wine. For red wine a glass with a wide bowl is usually taken, so the wine can breathe. For white the bowl is narrower, so the wine stays cool longer. For sparkling wine a flute is used, a narrow tall glass where the bubbles rise for longer, or a coupe, a wide shallow bowl. For tastings there is the ISO glass, a standard tasting glass.

Glasses are made by glassblowers, craftsmen who blow glass. Besides handwork there is also machine production. Crystal makes the walls thinner, which many people like.

The glass is one of the most familiar things next to wine. By comparison, milk is drunk from a tumbler and wine from a wine glass. The right shape helps a little to sense the taste, but an expensive glass is not necessary.