Don’t know if this will be helpful to anyone, but found it interesting to compare glasses today. Just got a couple of Grassl Cru glasses and compared to Zalto Burgundy and Grassl 1855 and Liberté. Left to right is 1855, Cru, Zalto Burg, and Liberté.
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So how do they perform in comparison?
Or did you just take a photo?
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Nice photo though.
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I think the Cru one is prettiest
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Have not yet had a chance to use the Cru. Like the Liberté a lot. Have used the 1855 only one time and suspect will like it a lot for bigger reds. The Liberté will likely get used for bubbles, most whites, and daily drinker reds. I have a soft spot for the Zalto Burgundy glass as we were given some that belonged to a good friend who passed too soon. It is a little large (960 ml capacity!) and my wife finds it awkward to hold with a narrow stem and large bowl so expect the smaller proportions of the Cru may be the ticket for red burgs and barolos but time will tell.
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I bought 2 glasses from crate and barrel that are like the Cru… work great
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Crate & Barrel has a lot of nice, thin stemware at quite good prices.
Zalto burgs are probably my favorite glasses. I use them for almost all reds I drink.
@John_Morris you’re totally right about crate and barrel wine glasses. I have purchases some in the past and gifted some to friends.
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My favorite glasses are whatever I’ve bought most recently. Variety is stimulating!
But it really is worth doing side-by-side comparisons with the same glasses. I forced comparisons on a group of mine where different members hosted and some had awful stemware. I poured the same wine into two different makes of stems and they were astonished by the difference.
That said, from taste and aroma standpoint, the most expensive ones don’t necessarily enhance the wine the most.
Many years ago, when Riedel was just coming into the US market, they hosted comparison tastings with different glasses. They used their own, some mid-tier glasses and thick Libby glasses like the ones you get in cafe. I couldn’t tell much difference between the medium priced ones and the Riedels!
I don’t mean to minimize the tactile and visual aesthetics. They can certainly offer their own pleasure, just as beautiful place settings or a wonderful ambience can enhance one’s experience.
My point is just to keep perspective on what the visual and physical appeal is versus what the glass actually does for the wine.
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100%, did this recently and it’s pretty apparent the differences in glasses. Some give a better nose, some give up more on the palate, just trying to find the right balance.
I did try the Cru vs. the Zalto Burg tonight. Was initially pleased with the nose in the Cru. Later, I tried the Zalto and got more on the nose than in the Cru. More experimentation is needed. I think I recall reading that some found the Cru better for older burgs and the Zalto better for younger Burgs. This was a 2014 A/C Gevrey from Esmonin so pretty young to me.
From my own limited side by side comparisons using Grassl Cru vs. Zalto Burg my very general guideline is - I’m using Cru for older red burgs and Zalto Burg for younger. This is based off 12-15 examples.
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You tried the Zalto later in the evening. I’m wondering if the difference was due to the glass or the wine opening up? I would like to see your findings tasting the wine at the same time side-by-side.
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The amount of nonsense around glassware never ceases to amaze me. Fortunately, we have a beautiful photo in the OP to illustrate that there is little actual difference between these glass shapes.
Elementary geometry tells you that the wine surface to glass volume ratio is pretty much the same across these four glasses. You think you can tell the 5 or 10% difference between them? And how high do you fill your glass? And what happens as you drink, and the level drops? And what order did you sample each glass?
Come on, the idea that “older burgundy tastes better from this glass”, but “younger burgundy tastes better from that glass” is just silly.
I’m here to tell you that there are a dozen things that impact your perception far more than glass shape.
What I will say is that these are beautiful stems! I have, and love drinking from the Liberte. But not because it makes the wine smell or taste better than my every day Riedel restaurant red wine glasses, but because it just makes the experience seem fancier.
Drink out of whatever glass appeals to your eye, and your hand, and your wallet.
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I did try them both side by side.
The size differences are more than 5-10%. Volume varies tremendously with small dimension changes. The Liberté has a capacity of I think 490 ml and the Zalto Burg nearly double at 960 ml. The Cru and 1855 are in between (720?). I cannot provide scientific proof, but I did note a difference in the intensity of the aroma between the Zalto Burg and the Cru side by side as did my wife. This was not confirmation bias as I was expecting the opposite result. But as they say, your mileage may vary. For me, I will continue to experiment and use what I like. I do agree that there is a lot of BS in the marketing claims surrounding glasses—especially in years past—but also think that the size and shape of glasses can have an effect on the nose.
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Yes, volume varies with diameter. But it does so in the same proportion as the surface area of the wine, which I assume is typically filled around the maximum diameter of the glass (and also varies substantially as you drink the wine). So the ratio of air space to liquid surface area is pretty similar across all four glasses. If they were perfect cylinders, it wouldn’t matter at all, they would be identical in ratio. The small differences attributable to the shape can’t be enough to matter, not in comparison to all the other factors that go into forming an impression about a wine.
Lots of factors—fill will vary, shape of glass, volume of glass, swirl or not, distance from wine to nose, width of opening, how one’s nose/shape of face/with or without eyeglasses fits or doesn’t in a given opening, type of wine, et al. Trying to account for all the variables is difficult. You clearly think the choice of glass does not matter. As I said in my last post, your mileage may vary. However, it does seem like most folks prefer to drink out of tulip shaped glasses and not out of Dixie cups.
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I think some aspects might make a modest difference, mainly the height, but that’s just a hunch. My point in this case is that all these glasses (and frankly pretty much every glass anyone talks about around here) have bowls of the same height, so with air space volume being the product of surface area of the liquid x height above the liquid (with some modest variation due to the sloped walls), they all have roughly the same volum-to-wine surface area ratio. The influence of the glass on how the wine smells simply can’t be very different across the array. It’s just simple geometry.
Well, while I appreciate your attempt to apply logic to the issue, I don’t think this issue is as simple as you make it out. There are many studies that have been done. Some of the effects of different wine glass shapes appear psychological in that when tasters cannot touch the glasses used, the ability to distinguish a difference from different glass shapes diminishes or disappears. Yet every study where tasters touched the glasses, differences were found. I never drink wine without holding and swirling with my glass. If you want to get into the weeds in this here is a link: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/227701843_Influence_of_glass_shape_on_wine_aroma
Bottom line is that we all have to find what works for us.
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