It is a popular belief that the glass you use to serve a fine wine is almost as important to your enjoyment of the drink as the choice of wine itself. The shape, colour and fabric of wine glasses are all supposed to influence the way you appreciate the flavour and aroma of a wine. Whether there is really any truth to this or not remains to be seen but there are some convincing arguments that a wine does taste better if drunk from the right glass.

So how do we tell which glasses we should be using? With thousands of different shapes and sizes out there it’s hard to know which ones will be the best. Most people agree that a specially designed glass is required for some types of wine. The most obvious example of this is tall, thin champagne flutes which are designed to retain the ‘fizziness’ in sparkling wines by reducing the surface area at the top of the glass. A serious wine enthusiast will also use different glasses for red and white wines – a rounder, wider bowl for reds to allow more space for the wine to breathe, and a slightly smaller, tulip-shaped bowl for whites to help retain their cool temperature.

But some take this theory a lot further. Real wine geeks say that the difference between wines runs a lot deeper than just the colour, and that for each different variety of wine there is a glass designed especially to enhance the experience of drinking it. No one has pursued this further than Riedel, the Austrian wine glass manufacturer that first came up with the idea. They actually produce customised glasses not only for different types of wine, but also for different varieties and vintages within each type – although few people could afford to collect the whole set!

As for what the glass is made out of, many people believe a fine wine tastes better if drunk from a crystal glass. This is not strictly true – although drinking from a lead crystal glass is usually considered to be more enjoyable. It’s actually more about the aroma than the flavour, the majority of what we ‘taste’ when we drink wine is in fact a combination of its smell and the the evaporated aromas in the mouth. Crystal wine glasses, due to their heightened lead content (for a glass to count as ‘Crystal’ in Europe it has to contain at least 24% lead) have a slightly rougher surface than glass, which helps to release the aroma better by causing friction as the wine moves inside the glass.

Aside from this, the differences are almost entirely aesthetic. A lead crystal glass is clearer and shows off the wine better, allowing real wine tasters to examine its ‘legs’ more easily. It’s also a lot heavier than glass – again because of the high lead content – sparkles more and makes that nice ringing sound when you tap it – science aside, crystal glasses are just generally more satisfying to drink from!

Wine can be enjoyed from a coffee mug if necessary, but somehow that look would leave a bit to be desired at your dinner party. The shape of wine glasses does actually enhance the aroma and taste of wine, thus increasing your whole wine drinking experience. Therefore it is important to know which kind of glass, or stemware, to serve which kind of wine in.

Manufacturers insist that fine crystal stemware is the ideal choice from which to enjoy your wine. You should choose a plain glass. Gold and silver goblets were fine for the olden days, but part of the enjoyment of drinking wine is the look of it. We like to observe the color, intensity and clarity. This will clue you in on certain important factors about your wine like texture, age and quality.

The size of the glass is important too. You need to be able to swirl the wine about the glass to release its bouquet and to aerate it, thus enhancing the flavor. You need to be able to get your nose close enough to inhale the fruity aromas wafting up. But you don’t want those aromas to disappear too quickly into the surrounding air; this is where the shape of the glass comes in.

Did you ever wonder why most wine glasses have a larger bowl that curves in to a narrower rim? The large bowl releases the aroma, while the narrower rim stops it dissipating before you’ve had a chance to inhale. The different shapes of the glasses also change the position of your head when you are taking a mouthful, so that the wine spreads over all your taste buds; it doesn’t just stream down the center of your tongue. Since different areas of our tongue support different tastes, this is important. We could miss some of the sweet flavor if the wine misses the tip of our tongue.

So if you have a nice red wine, choose a tulip-shaped glass. For Bordeaux you’ll need a tall glass with wide bowl. This directs the wine to the back of the mouth and also will allow the wine to breathe. Burgundy will need a similarly shaped glass only with a bigger bowl.

For white wine the glasses will need to be small to keep the wine at its cooler temperature. Chardonnay glasses will be taller, the bowl less pronounced that red wine glasses. Champagne glasses are really tall and thin so you can see the bubbles rising. This shape also concentrates the delicate aroma.

Experts recommend that wine glasses be washed in plain water only. Otherwise, soap can build up in the bowl and ruin the delicate flavor of the wine.