For the second installment in my Beer Geekery 101 series, I'm once again donning my professor hat to give you some tips on maximizing your beer drinking experience. Tonight, I'll be focusing on glassware. I'll cover proper glass cleaning technique in another post (trust me, its worthy of its own entry, lots to talk about).
First, let's establish a simple fact: It is always preferable to drink beer from a glass rather than the bottle or can. And no, a Solo plastic cup doesn't qualify as glassware. A glass is preferred over straight from the bottle because a bottle or can limits the extent to which you can enjoy and appreciate the beer. Drinking beer sans glass prevents you from seeing the beer's color or allowing a proper head to form. Head is important to beer as it contributes to the mouthfeel and thus your overall impression of the beer. The color and clarity, or lack thereof, of the the beer is important because beer is best enjoyed if you can assess all aspects of the beer, its appearance, feel, taste, and smell. Which brings me to the next reason why a glass is important. Drinking from the bottle or can means that you are completely excluding your nose from the situation. Our sense of smell is of paramount importance when tasting any food or drink. That's why nothing tastes good when your nose is stuffed up, because smell is a major component of taste itself.
Now that we've established that a glass is essential to any good beer drinking experience, you might be asking yourself, "Hey, I've always just poured my beer in a pint glass. Isn't that good enough?" The answer is, well, sort of. I will once again revert to my mantra that beer ought to be fun and that no one should ever look down on you for how you like having a beer. That being said, not all glassware is created equal. There are many styles of glass out there and many of them have highly specialized shapes and sizes that best express the styles for which they were designed. My standard drinkware is my Libbey Poco Grande Glass (pictured in most of my beer reviews). This glass is what's referred to as a tulip glass. It has a bulbous lower body on a stem that tapers toward the neck and then flares open at the mouth. This particular shape, while attractive and classy, is also very utilitarian as the large body provides ample room for voluminous heads to grow while the narrow neck channels volatile aromatics up toward my nose and the wider opening guarantees that the beer will cascade over my entire mouth, allowing me to get an accurate impression of the beer every time it comes to my lips. Add to that the glass is far sturdier than your average wine glass and we have a real winner here. I purchased a four pack of this glass through bedbathandbeyond.com and it cost a measly $10 plus shipping. Trust me, this is a worthwhile investment. If you're not sold on a tulip glass, even though they are suitable for nearly every style, there are other options out there. A good red wine glass or brandy snifter make a fine vessel for sampling many a tasty beer. Sam Adams produces a very available glass they call the Perfect Pint glass that is a marriage between the tulip and traditional pint glass style. I have a Perfect Pint myself and I love it for sturdy, hoppy beers like IPAs and Pale Ales. It also does great with amber ales and brown ales. For wheat beers like German Hefeweizens, I recommend a taller, slender, stemless glass that tapers slightly at the center and opens again for a wide mouth, much like what pilsners and mainstream light lagers are often served in when you order a larger size of draft beer at a restaurant. This style will also work well with the pilsner, although the classic footed pilsner is an option if you're looking to expand your glass collection.
Belgian beers should have a glassware entry of their own. Some are served in goblets, some in tulips, some in snifters. Others are served in tumblers, flutes, or chalices. General rule: Rich, heavier beers should use a goblet or snifter while lighter beers can use tulips. This is a gross oversimplification, however; the truth is that many breweries in Belgium are very particular about their glassware and often produce their own glasses to accompany their beer. If a brewery, Belgian or otherwise, produces a specialty glass, its a safe bet that you should use that glass for many if not all of their beers. For example, every time I drink a Dogfish Head beer, it gets poured straight into my Dogfish signature glass, which is one damn fine glass. Another popular brewery-branded glass is Duvel's infamous oversized tulip, perfectly suited for the massive head that their beer produces. Because I'm rather invested in my beer drinking habits (read slightly obsessive), I often won't drink a beer out of branded glassware unless the beer and the glass match, even though I have a large and varied collection of brewery glasses. For this reason, I keep various unbranded glasses including my Libbey Poco Grande and several awesome glasses from Crate & Barrel on hand at all times.
The glasses I've mentioned by name here are all fantastic and certainly worth adding to or starting your collection. As I said, you can also use a large red wine glass or snifter if you're unsure about the difference that a glass can make. Some folks out there contend that glassware doesn't impact a beer enough, if at all, that one should obsess over it as I do. But I'm putting the information out there so that you can try out various glasses and make up your own mind. Beer is fun and you should do what you want. I'm just here to offer some friendly advice from someone who's been around the dance floor a couple times. Cheers!
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