Ever Wonder? What is the Right Amount of Wine to Pour into a Glass?

Well, first let me start by saying you can never have too much wine, right? While that may be true, you can actually have too much wine in your glass. Pouring the ‘right’ amount of wine into a wine glass can actually enhance your enjoyment of the wine.

While we taste with our tongue, it only provides us with a limited amount of information. If you’ve ever tried eating something (like a slice of orange) while holding your nose closed, you’ll know that food has limited flavor when you don’t include the food smells or aromas that enter through your nose.

This is true with wines. While our tongues can only detect the basic tastes (sweet, salt, bitter and sour), our nose is capable of detecting thousands of aromas. Put another way, taste refers to what’s going on inside our mouth including our tongue. But, aromas are detected inside our noses and relates specifically to our sense of smell. Put them both together and you get flavor!

Now, this is where the wine glass comes in. If you fill your wine glass to the top, as shown in the picture, and take a sip, you’ll certainly get taste on your tongue and a bit of aroma as the glass approaches your mouth. But, if instead you fill the glass just about one-third full, just to the point where the glass is at its widest point, you’ll leave the upper two-thirds for the aromas. And, by giving your glass a slight swirl (yes, wine drinkers swirl for a reason!), you’ll release even more aromas into the bowl of your wine glass. Then, when the wine glass approaches your mouth, take a sniff and then a sip. The wine will then have even more flavor.

This is a simple yet very effective trick to get even more enjoyment out of a glass of wine. Cheers!

Confusing Sweetness and Fruitiness in Wine

Many wine drinkers may confuse the taste sensations of sweet and fruity. While our brain naturally associates fruit aromas and flavors with sweetness, they are often not directly associated with each other when it comes to wine.

“Fruity” is a term that gets used to describe a wine that has pronounced flavors or aromas of fruits. With wines, you may experience aromas and flavors of citrus (lemon, lime, orange), orchard fruits (apples, pears), stone fruits (apricots, peaches, plums), tropical fruits (pineapple, mango), red fruits (strawberries, cherries, cranberries, raspberries), or dark fruits (blackberries, blueberries, black currant). These wine flavors and aromas may be processed and interpreted as being “sweet.” But, fruity wines aren’t necessarily sweet. Sauvignon Blanc is a good example. While it offers bright fruit flavors of grapefruit, lime, pear and peach, it is typically low in residual sugar.

For a wine to be sweet, it must have residual sugars (RS). That is, sugar that is intentionally left in the juice that doesn’t get converted to alcohol during fermentation. The categories of wine sweetness include “Dry” (1-10 g/L RS), “Off Dry” (10-35 g/L RS), “Sweet” (35-120 g/L RS) and “Very Sweet” (120+ g/L RS).

Most wines on the store shelf are “Dry” but if you’re looking for sweeter white wines look for Kabinett or Spätlese Riesling, Chenin Blanc or Gewürztraminer. Lambrusco is a sweeter, sparkling red wine. Sweeter red wines, by brand, include Ménage á Trois Red (12 g/L RS), Apothic Red (15 g/L RS), Cocobon Red Blend (12 g/L RS), Yellow Tail Shiraz (12 g/L RS) and Jam Jar (57 g/L RS).

So, don’t be fooled. “Fruity” wine traits don’t necessarily mean it’s a sweet wine. Cheers!