2WineSnobs

Bottle or Glass?

The first question you’ll have to answer when ordering wine in a restaurant is whether you want it by the bottle or by the glass. Your choice depends on how much you plan to drink, whether you want to drink one or a few different wines through the course of the meal, and, for reasons of wine and food pairing, the different foods each dinner guest is ordering.

By the Glass

There are three reasons to buy wine by the glass:

• If you and your party won’t drink an entire bottle.
• If you want to be able to try more than one wine during the course of your dinner.
• If you are your dinner companion(s) are ordering foods that are difficult to pair with a single wine (or you have significantly different tastes in wine).

By the Bottle

Wine by the bottle is a good move if you and your partner plan to drink more than one glass apiece, and don’t mind drinking more than one glass of the same wine (most people don’t mind this at all). In this case, you should definitely buy a bottle because an entire bottle costs less than an equal amount of wine bought by the glass.

If you want to buy a bottle but you and your dinner companion(s) are ordering very different foods (such as salmon and beef), try to order wines that pair well across many foods: good options are Pinot Noirs, Beaujolais, Chianti, and Barbera.