Yesterday I read a post about drinking wine from plastic cups, on Serious Eats. In the post, Deb Harkness (who writes the blog Good Wine Under $20) spoke about a tasting hosted by Georg Riedel, where she learned the importance of proper stemware. She suggests that people ditch their plastic cups and spend about as much on a single wine glass as they would on a bottle of wine, among other things. The discussion heated up in the comments section. Despite good intentions, people seemed truly fired up by being told what to drink out of! I was surprised that something so harmless could cause such a stir.

Ideally you would have a glass of wine for every occasion whether a polycarbonate wine glass for outdoor barbeques, an O glass for casual get-togethers, or Fusion wine glasses for elegant dinner parties. But some people prefer a stemless glass for all occasions due to lack of storage space or ease of cleanup, while others prefer to use stems all the time because of their elegance, ease of swirling and temperature preservation. Maybe you even use plastic cups because you’re by a pool or on a hike, where glassware isn’t feasible. Personally if I can’t access a great glass, I’d rather drink great wine out of a crummy glass, than crummy wine! I don’t think that the price of the glass needs to be calibrated to the price of the wine.

You should never feel forced to spend a certain amount on a glass or to use a certain type of glass, but guidelines are helpful. In the end it comes down to your budget and your own taste.

As the weather heats up, outdoor entertaining and BBQ’s are on the mind. For a successful party, it is crucial to be armed with casual, elegant glassware that will impress your guests and avoid headaches for you! Shattered glassware on an outdoor patio is never fun to clean up. For this reason, we are excited to offer our new, Unbreakable PolyCarbonate Stemware. These glasses are crafted from a sturdy polycarbonate material which is unbreakable yet thin enough to be elegant. We offer them in varietal-enhancing shapes like Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Cabernet , Champagne and more. These are the stems you cannot live without this season! We put the polycarbonate stems to the test in our video demo, check it out here:
 
 
 

Click here to view the embedded video.