Lodi Amateur Vintners host Riedel glassware tasting

The Lodi Amateur Vintners Association brought Tanya Seibold, the Northern California Winery Sales Manager from the Riedel Glass Works, to make a presentation to club members about Riedel stemware at their regular meeting on June 18, 2008. The event was held at Heritage Oak Winery, with the business portion held in the tasting room and the presentation held in the covered area in back. About thirty people were present.

For the presentation, Tanya used four pieces of  variety-specific stemware from Riedel’s “Vinum Extreme” collection, including pieces designed for Cabernet Sauvignon,  Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Riesling.  The four examples used were leaded pieces of machine-made stemware.   These are shown here.  From Left: Cabernet, Pinot Noir, Riesling, Chardonnay. 

My first impressions was the unusual shape of each piece.  “”Harumph! Moonware!” I thought when I first saw them.  I picked up a glass. The lead obviously added a surprising amount of density, but it felt good to hold.  It was well balanced and very comfortable in the hand.

Tanya had set a place for each person with a place mat, and on it had put each of the four Riedel glasses plus one more. The fifth glass was an empty 9 ounce tasting glass which she referred to as the “joker”.  Each of the Riedel glasses held wine.  The Chardonnay glass held Chardonnay, the Cabernet glass had, well, Cabernet. (You can see where this is going.)  Can anyone tell me what was in the  Pinot Noir glass?  But here’s a surprise: The Riesling glass had Zinfandel.  I guess it also doubles as the piece for Zin.  She instructed us to swirl the wine, breathe in the aroma, then taste the wine.  At that point we were encouraged to describe the experience.  She helped a lot.  A lot of heads were nodding while she talked about the flavors and aromas. 

Tanya then asked us to pour the remaining Chardonnay into the joker glass and repeat the process.  Most of those present were pretty much dumbfounded.  What had been a fairly elegant wine in the first glass became an ordinary one in the second.  The same procedure was repeated with each of the other three wines, with the resulting discussions being pretty much the same.

“What if you have Zinfandel in the Chardonnay glass?  someone asked. 

“I knew someone would ask that,” Tanya said.

We went back to the Zinfandel and re-tasted it.  She then directed us to pour the Chardonnay into the joker and replace it with the Zin and taste it again.  Here the difference was not as striking as when comparing the Zin glass with the joker glass, but there were subtle differences.

“How does Riedel make a glass that improves the enjoyment of wine?” was the next question.

Tanya explained that each bowl was engineered to enhance the wine in a variety of ways. First, because these pieces were made of leaded crystal, they have tiny, imperceptible bumps and protrusions on the inside of the bowl.  As the wine is swirled, it is volatilized by the protrusions, making the bouquet more pronounced. 

Next, the shape of the bowl, perhaps the most obvious feature of each piece, does several things.  Its design effectively captures the bouquet and retains it so that it can be thoroughly inhaled and appreciated. Each is large enough to allow the taster to inhale the aroma of the wine while tasting it.  That’s right.  You get your lips on the rim and your nose in the bowl, engaging not only the five flavors the tongue picks up, but bringing into play the 100,000 separate scents the human nose can detect. 

Finally and most interestingly, the bowl of each variety-specific piece is designed to deliver the wine to that portion of the palate that will be most perceptive to the flavors of this specific wine.  For example the Chardonnay glass delivers wine to the middle and then down the sides of the tongue to emphasize first the richness and body of the wine and secondly the acidity and fruit components.  The Cabernet glass delivers the wine across the tongue to the back of the palate, where the tannins are perceived.  This notion still amazes me. I thought that if the wine glass got the wine to my mouth, and across my lips, its job was done.  Apparently Riedel stemware also directs traffic.

“How much does one of these glasses cost?” This question Tanya answered with a stunning piece of logic: People think nothing of spending $25, $30, $50, sometimes $80 or more on a bottle of wine. They then take it home and store it in a temperature controlled cellar that costs anywhere from several hundred to thousands of dollars, and then spend more money on energy to keep the wine under optimum conditions.  But then they turn around and serve it in stemware that costs five dollars.  What does that do to their investment in wine?  It seems the nice folks at Riedel will tell you the quality of the stemware should match the quality of the wine.  If you routinely serve wine that you paid $50 for, you should be serving it in stemware that matches that price per glass. “A worthwhile investment for life-long pleasure”, she says.

Each of the pieces used in the presentation sells in a box of four for around $118.

LAVA President Jim Schweickardt summarized the presentation, saying “This is nothing short of astounding.”

I agree that the difference the Riedel pieces make is remarkable.  Now my problem is where am I going to put all these pieces of fancy stemware I need to buy.

If by chance you read this and would like to try the experience yourself, contact Tanya at tanya@riedelusa.net.