Drink This Now! Lesson 2 Activity

On Saturday, September 15, I took a trip to Cellar Wine & Spirits to purchase two bottles of wine to try out Drink This Now! Lesson 2. I picked up one aromatic red wine (Shiraz) and one aromatic white wine (Gewürztraminer). 

First of all -- this place is AWESOME! With labels from wine grapes to unique wine production locations (Greece, Croatia, etc.), this wine store has it all set up for wine drinkers with even minor knowledge. Would highly recommend. It was simple to find the two wines I was looking for. The employee at the shop helped me locate the two bottles I selected, and gave me a few opinions he had on each. Overall, the shopping experience was easy because of the customer service aspect of this wine shop.

Now for the experiment!

Shot glass with a stem (LOL), "rocks" glass, regular water glass, flared smaller wine glass, bigger flared wine glass and a bowl to act as a "fishbowl."

I lined up six glassware options to try out the wines. I used all the sizes of glassware you can find in a college student's home -- and was kind of impressed by the different wine glasses we had! As instructed, I poured Pacific Rim Gewürztraminer from Yakima Valley into each of the containers for the sniff test:

After giving each of the glassware's a swirl, I sniffed each of them and waited a minute between to make sure I had a clear distinction between them. 

Shot glass: I wasn't sure I knew what lychee smelled like from lectures, but I definitely detect it in this original scent. In fact, it's the only thing I can smell in this one.

"Rocks" glass: this glass gives much more of a detectable scent than the shot glass. From this test, I can smell rich fruits, but definitely not dark fruits like I'm used to smelling. This isn't the scent I'm used to, as I usually drink red wine. It's harder to describe than usual.

Water glass: from this detection, I can smell a more floral hint. It combines with the lychee scent and the lighter fruit, though I still can't pinpoint what kind of fruit exactly. I notice that the swirl test is harder to conduct in a glass this shape, as I don't feel like any time I swirl I'm "painting" the whole glass.

Small wine glass: to begin, I can definitely detect this scent from further away than I could from the water glass. The complexity is getting higher as my wine glass gets bigger. From this scent, I can detect fruit, florals and lychee, but much more intertwined than the first few glasses. They smell like they go well together in this glass.

Large wine glass: one major observation I picked up on was how helpful the "rounded bowl" part of the glass is for the swirl. This smell is very similar to the small wine glass, but the rounded bowl shape helps to give off a scent before even trying to smell the wine. I like how this glass and the smaller wine glass concentrate the molecules in a way that mixes them together, making all the different flavors in harmony.

"Fishbowl": it was pretty impossible to smell out of this large fishbowl. I had to really lean in to try and sniff something, and even when I did, I couldn't pick out much. I can smell the lychee like the shot glass depicted, but the floral and fruit accents seem to go away.

As directed, I tried the wine from the different sized glasses in random order. Starting with the shot glass, the wine comes off to be like sparkling wine, with clear fruit flavors but nothing too exciting. Next, I tried it out of the regular water glass. From here, I can taste a more melon-y hint than just fruit, but still don't feel like the complexity is all there. Next, I tried from the rounded bowl wine glass. This really gave off a different taste than the ones prior. I can taste the floral accents, with the fruit flavors as the aftermath. It's easy to swirl, sniff and taste -- making the experience much more encompassing, if that makes sense. Next, I tried it from the "rocks" glass. This was the same reaction I had from the water glass -- just kind of plain, and didn't feel like I got the full effect as I did from the larger wine glass. As I'm doing this, I realize it's very obvious that the shape of the glass effects how your nose perceives it. And, as we learned, the scents are much less easy to detect without swirling the glass to paint it, making the molecules cover the glass. 

Next, I repeated the same process with the Fox Brook Shiraz red wine from California:

I started again by swirling each size glass before the initial sniff test. Here are my observations:

Shot glass: a rich odor can be detected, and definitely a sweet fruit scent. I would predict dark red fruits or berries by the smell, but wouldn't say I can smell anything but fruit.

"Rocks" glass: immediately, I can smell more from this glass than the glass prior. I can smell a hint of wood, or oak, from this one. The dark fruit scent is still there.

Water glass: the oak-y smell is much more pronounced in this glass. It already surprised me how much more I can smell here than in the shot glass. I still smell fruit and oak, as before. There wasn't a huge difference between this one and the "rocks" glass, and I had to stick my nose further into it to really detect any difference.

Small wine glass: for starters, I can definitely tell that the smell is better concentrated in this glass. We learned in lecture that the flared glasses are meant to put the wine molecules in a place where you could smell it, since lots of flavor detection comes from scent. This wine smells more complex, and is easier to smell from a further distance from the glass. I can tell now what I would've smelled at the start of drinking this wine, if I had not done this experiment. Now, I smell a more fruit-forward richness with an oak hint.

Large wine glass: one major observation I picked up on was how helpful the "rounded bowl" part of the glass is for the swirl. The smell is similar to the small wine glass, but after swirling, I could already smell the wine as I leaned in to smell it. The oak, fruit scent is still there, but much more identifiable than in any of the smaller glasses.

"Fishbowl": this was the most difficult to test, as I had to literally stick my face in the bowl to detect anything. Even when I did, it doesn't smell so fruity, but rather more "boring" I'd say. Not much odor is even recognized because it's hard to get close enough to the wine itself to smell it.

As directed, I tried the wine from the different sized glasses in random order. Starting with the shot glass, the wine has a kick when you swallow it and I really only taste dark fruits. Next, I went to the small wine glass. From this glass, the wine tasted much more complex and I could again taste the hint of oak that I smelled in the original test. Next, the "rocks" glass. I can taste the same thing from this glass as the small wine glass, but the biggest difference was that I could not smell it before tasting it. It kind of hit me unexpected, because there was no initial scent. This was the same for the regular wine glass. My favorite, not surprisingly, was drinking it out of the big bowled wine glass, because the smell was concentrated and the entire experience was aromatic. It is very obvious the smaller glasses allow for the molecules to spread out, causing a more unexpected taste than by the wine glasses that gave you a hint of the taste from the smell before drinking.

As directed, I went back and cupped the red wine big glass bowl with my hands, sloshing around the liquid to paint the glass. Same thing for the smaller glass. What I can say changed was how much "extra" the big wine glass had in its smell. There were more complex flavors detected, whereas the small glass just came off fruity once again. After tasting these two, it's the same way for me. Both of these gave off stronger wiffs than they had without this added test, but it was clear that the larger glass provided the wine much more room to spread out. The big wine glass detects an oaky, rich, fruit-forward red wine, while the smaller glass detects fruit and feels more thin on the tongue.

Conclusion
Clearly, not all glasses are created equal. I found that the smaller the glass, the less scent I could detect.  When it comes to wine glasses, I enjoy the ones that are more bowl-like by the stem and flared to the nose. This is because it's an immersive experience to drink the wine, as you get a hint of the taste from the smell before even letting it hit your palate. This experiment was very interesting, and I had some of my friends try it too!