How people expect wine to be served is reflective of wine’s historical role to a given society. They are highlighting wine’s origins as an agricultural product, meant more for the kitchen table than the auction block. More significantly, in serving celebrated wines in modest glassware, high-end bistros and wine bars – in France and beyond – make a gesture that is as political as it is aesthetic. This makes it appropriate for dining establishments with limited space and in economies with higher labour costs and lower margins on wine there is a bigger picture to bear in mind when griping about simple glassware. There are also more anodyne reasons: simple glassware is cheaper, easier to wash, less breakable, and takes up less shelf space. If one finds oneself in a bistro or wine bar that offers no Zaltos or Spiegelaus, it is first and foremost because one is in a bistro or wine bar. In France, elaborate glassware is almost exclusively the province of restaurants. ‘Restaurants’, in France, are subdivided between standard restaurants and ‘gastronomic’ restaurants, the latter of which usually aspire to Michelin stars. In English, the word ‘restaurant’ is applied equally to fast food joints, gastropubs, and white-tablecloth dining establishments but the French differentiate between informal bistros and more formal restaurants. Perhaps unintentionally, the comment touches upon the linguistic misunderstanding between French wine bistros and the anglophone wine folk aghast at their glassware. “If you claim to be a top class restaurant or a top class wine bar,” wrote one aggrieved commenter, “serve the wines in the correct glasses dammit!” Don't get me started about wine glasses in France.” Below each tweet, a chorus of anger at the sorts of wine glass used at Paris wine bistros like Le Baratin, Aux Deux Amis, or Coinstot Vino.
Woolf, author and contributor to this magazine, recently tweeted that he hates “the teeny-weeny wine glasses that are so often preferred at French-focused natural wine establishments.” Financial Times wine critic Jancis Robinson replied, “Grrr.
But nothing raises the ire of anglophone wine writers like small wine glasses – the simple ones, of modest volume, which are iconic to the French bistro. Many things are smaller in France: cars, portion sizes during brunch, the workweek.
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