Glassware craftsman demonstrates how different vessels affect taste

I have a lot of friends and associates who take their alcohol spending very seriously. Whether it’s craft beer, fine Scotch or a bottle of wine that costs more than a typical month’s rent, these folks spend quite a bit of time — and money — searching out the bottles of their dreams.

So why isn’t more thought put into the vessels we pour that liquor into? I’ve had friends serve me $15 microbrews in the cans they were shipped in, drunk Pappy Van Winkle out of a simple shot glass, and sipped decades-old wine out of flimsy plastic flutes more appropriate for cheap Champagne.

For a long time I figured as long as the alcohol was making it into my system, it was doing its job. That couldn’t be farther from the truth, as 10th-generation stemware producer Georg Riedel pointed out when he returned to Honolulu for an educational wine tasting at the Halekulani on March 25.

Riedel, 66, has spent more than 40 years improving upon the quality of products his family has produced in Europe since the 17th century. His father, Claus Riedel, helped establish the company as an authority in handmade, mouth-blown crystal and wine glasses. Georg Riedel took those original designs and elevated them from fine glassware into vital tools for oenophiles to use when deciphering the layers of flavors in their favorite vintage.

“We definitely know how the glasses should look,” Riedel said during an interview at the Halekulani before last month’s seminar. “What (the glass) gives to the beverage is balance.

“Sweet, salty, sour and bitter — these four components are what can vary with a glass. It’s like music, where you have an equalizer to balance the high tones and low tones. This is the best way to explain what the glass tries to do — bring all these elements in food and wine and display them so they have the best equilibrium, the best balance.”

Riedel illustrated this at the Halekulani with a flight of three wines, some cold water and a bottle of Coca-Cola. Using three glasses from his company’s new Veritas lineup, he first had guests pour cold water into each one to explore how they delivered liquid to different parts of the palate.

The Veritas New World Pinot Noir, for example, hit the front of my tongue before collecting on the sides of my mouth. The Veritas Cabernet/Merlot glass — which Riedel called the best water glass in the world — distributed the cold water across my palate before cascading evenly down the back of my throat. The Veritas Old World Syrah was sort of in between the two, guiding liquid from the front of my palate straight to the back and avoiding the sides completely.

“People choose glasses (based on) how they look,” he said. “The glass that doesn’t always look appealing to them might actually be the right glass. We try to do our very best job with events like this to educate our customers.”

Following the water experiment, Riedel had guests try three types of wine in Veritas glasses. Almost as if he wanted to show there was no magic involved, Riedel repeatedly had guests pour wine out of one glass and into another. We swirled and sipped, awestruck at how the same wine exhibited floral aromas and fruity flavors in one glass but turned into bitter, mineral-tasting swill when drunk from another.

Part of the equation is the amount of tannins in a wine, which impart a dryness and/or bitterness toward the back of your throat when drinking it, Riedel said. The New World Pinot Noir glass was made for wines produced from thin-skinned grapes, while the Old World Syrah and Cabernet/Merlot glasses are designed for wines made from grapes with progressively thicker skin.

“Tannins should never overpower, but integrate with the overall flavor profile of the wine,” he explained, adding that wine glasses are actually tools to assist with tannin management and shouldn’t be engineered to focus solely on one flavor component of a particular vintage. “How can I translate a bottle of wine for your senses? There’s no hocus-pocus involved, only physics.”

Along with three wine glasses, guests received a glass recently commissioned by Coca-Cola. More than a dozen company employees joined Riedel to test 40 different glass styles, and the one presented at the Halekulani last month only underscored how the way a glass is made can affect the taste of what’s inside.

While the Coke tasted like, well, plain old Coke when gulped straight from the bottle, the Riedel glass had a transformative effect on both the aroma and mouthfeel of the beverage. In the glass there were more licorice spice and sugary-sweet smells that carried over to its taste, and the carbonation bubbles felt more appealing on my tongue. It was like drinking two completely different sodas.

The Veritas lineup currently offers a martini glass, with a beer glass set for release next month; the Riedel website also includes a number of other glasses the company has created to enjoy spirits like tequila, port, single-malt whiskey, brandy and cognac. If you’re serious about getting the maximum amount of enjoyment out of your drinks, take some time and explore how the shape of your glassware plays a vital role in the process.

Jason Genegabus has written about Honolulu bars since 2001. Contact him at jason@staradvertiser.com with suggestions of places to visit and drinks to try; read his blog at inthemix.staradvertiserblogs.com.