Barrels & Bottles Wine Blog

Extreme care should be taken when cleaning your delicate and precious wine glasses. Hand-washing is the best option to prevent machine scratching and breakages. Always wash a single glass at a time ensuring nothing else (such as cutlery) are in the washing bowl. Dishwashers are best avoided as residues from previous wash cycles can become very abrasive and will scratch glasses with ease.

Wherever possible a detergent is best avoided. Hot water is often enough to clean most glasses. For stubborn stains a mild detergent can be used but should be rinsed thoroughly with clean hot water several times to remove any taint and film on the glass. Any grease of film can be seen by holding the glass up to natural daylight and you will see greasy residue that will shimmer with blues and greens. If you see this then wash and rinse the glass again in only clean, hot water.

The water should be hot enough for the glasses to dry by themselves. The water should simply evapourate from the cleaned glass - drying should not be necessary and thereby avoids streaking. Ensure the glasses are totally dry before storing. Always clean your glasses again with hot water before using again to remove any dust accumulated whilst in storage.

Care should be taken to prevent the glass cracking by using very hot water in cold surroundings. The sudden change in temperature to a cold wine glass being placed into very hot water can often cause the glass to crack and break. I have personally broken a crystal decanter in this way!

Always try and carry a couple of spare glasses to your set as breakages are inevitable - especially at the more exuberant dinner parties. Finding replacement wine glasses at a later time may be difficult if the range has been discontinued.

Labels: accessories