Temperature of glassware for sparking wines

[Waiters Friend]

G'day

I am hoping for some advice.

On one hand, I have some friends who swear that by keeping their flutes in the freezer, they get better/more bubbles when they pour their sparkling wine into them. On the other, I've heard the opposing viewpoint - more bubbles when glasses are at room temperature.

Fortunately, I don't know of anyone who microwaves their flutes before use

I am aware that bubbles (under either scenario) emanate from nucleation points (points of imperfection in the smoothness of the glass), but I am unsure why temperature would make a significant difference (except perhaps bubbles expanding at higher temperature).

Any thoughts, or science behind either of these claims?

Cheers

Allan

[Softie]

Allan,

Interesting. How about running an informal experiment: eg two ostensibly identical glasses - one room temp, one ex-fridge/freezer - and maybe pore the 2nd and third glasses into these and at least observe the bead (maybe especially at the top because that takes frosting out of the equation.

Of course this is informal and plenty of confounders could affect the result, but it might help and is easy to do as a by product of normal drinking.

John

[Mike Hawkins]

Allan,

I feel too many people drink champagne / sparkling wine too cold. The nose is not very expressive as a result. As such, I see no value in chilling the glasses beforehand. As for which option has the most bubbles, I'm afraid I can't help there.

Mike

[Daniel Jess]

In my experience, putting the glasses in the freezer first shocks the wine a little too much and sadly I found that out the hard way - tasting some of the most expensive champagnes you could imagine when in London.... gah!

However, refrigeration is fine at home. In a restaurant situation, I believe it's best to serve in room temperature glasses as it's not only more practical, but you're not going to see a huge benefit from chilling the glass ever-so-slightly in a normal fridge before pouring. That is, unless the room temp is very high like it gets around Christmas Day in Qld!