Skip to main content

The Manual may earn a commission when you buy through links on our site.

The Spiegelau Glass Is The Perfect IPA Glass

the perfect ipa glass
Image used with permission by copyright holder
Back when I was in college, I spent part of one summer working in the tasting room of a small vineyard tucked away in the northwestern region of the Wilamette valley. At the time, I wasn’t particularly fond of wine. I was always more of a beer enthusiast than anything else, but this job quickly got me up to speed on all the finer details of drinking and appreciating good wine. Working in the tasting room meant I had to not only know about proper wine and food pairings, but also the appropriate glassware for any varietal in the cellar.

I ended up leaving the job well before I had to go back to school, but one thing I took away was a deep appreciation for well-designed glassware. When my boss first explained to me why each glass was shaped in a certain way, and went into detail on how various shapes deliver certain flavors to the palate, I was extremely skeptical. But the more I drank from them, the more I realized that she was absolutely right – a good glass can in fact improve the flavor of wine.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that the same concept applies to beer, but aside from the Samuel Adams Boston Lager glass, there hasn’t been much innovation in beer-specific glassware – until now. Bavarian glassmaker Spiegelau set out over a year ago to design a glass that would accentuate the flavor of American “hop-forward” IPA’s, and this glass is what they came up with.

The company tested over 100 different glass prototypes before they narrowed it down to 8 finalists and 12 semifinalists. Then they brought in the pros to pick the winner. Spiegelau recruited Sam Calagione and Ken Grossman – the respective founders of Dogfish Head Brewery and Sierra Nevada – to perform a series of taste tests and determine a winner. The vessel pictured above is the one they chose.

To see if this glass really does anything for the taste of an IPA, we did an A/B comparison of this glass against your typical pint glass, cleansing our palates between sips like proper scientists. Right after a fresh pour, the taste difference between the two isn’t super pronounced. The nose, however, is vastly better with this glass. The shape pushes the fruity aroma of the hops right into your nostrils as the beer hits your lips, which makes every swallow a fuller, more enoyable sensory experience.

After a few gulps, the subtle differences in taste between the two glasses become increasingly apparent. The thin glass construction helps the beer retain its temperature longer in the IPA glass, and the design keeps the beer tasting fresh until the last drop. It’s got a hop etched on the bottom, but rather than being a merely decorative addition, this serves to help the beer stay bubbly and carbonated long after it’s poured. After you drink it down to around the bottom of the bell, the beer falls back into the glass in a way that curns and reinvigorates your brew. Whereas the last sip tastes flat and warm by this point with a typical pint glass, the last gulp in this IPA glass tastes crisp and cold.

These glasses have been making quite a splash on the web – they’ve popped up on just about every beer and design blog in existence in the past few weeks, and since Spiegelau’s production run was somewhat limited, they’re currently a bit tough to  find. Dogfish Head and Spiegelau are sold out at the moment, but Sierra Nevada still has a few in stock. You can pick one up for just $9.00 plus shipping, and we advise ordering sooner than later – they’re selling like hotcakes.

Drew Prindle
Drew is our resident tech nerd. He’s spent most of his life trying to be James Bond, so naturally he’s developed an…
Forget wine — Beer and cheese is an unbeatable combination
Put the corkscrew away and crack open a cold one
Beer and cheese

When one hears the term cheese pairings, wine is the beverage that most often comes to mind, we'd wager. Because, of course, it is. The pairing of wine and cheese is as classic a coupling as peanut butter and jelly, bacon and eggs, or chocolate and strawberries. They're meant to be together. But that certainly doesn't mean that wine is the only adult beverage that can dance an alluring tango alongside everyone's favorite dairy product. Beer, as humble as its reputation can be, is also a beautiful balance to cheese's immense offering of flavors. While some may think of beer as not being as multi-dimensional and varied in its palate-pleasing capabilities as wine, this is not the case - especially now that we live in a world with so many exquisite craft beers, stouts, and lagers.
Of course, another classic accompaniment to cheese is bread or crackers. Why might that be, one might ask. Is it because we're simply in need of a starchy vessel to usher the cheese into our mouths? The answer is actually a bit deeper than that. Starches like bread and crackers are made from the same yeasty ingredients as beer, so their pairing makes perfect culinary sense.
This isn't to say, though, that one can simply pick up a hunk of cheddar and crack open a Budweiser and expect culinary artistry. The science is a bit more nuanced than that, so we're here to help you find the best pairings for your favorite beers and cheeses.

How to pair beer and cheese

Read more
Mijenta has a new cristalino tequila — here’s why bourbon fans will love it
Mijenta has a cristalino tequila perfect for bourbon drinkers
Mijenta Cristalino

If you’re new to tequila, you might not know all the terms. Even if you’re just a beginner, you probably know all about blanco, reposado, añejo, and maybe even joven. But chances are, you’re not familiar with Cristalino tequila. This reasonably contemporary style is simply añejo tequila that’s been charcoal filtered to remove its natural caramel color and various impurities.

The style is more than just a little popular. It’s actually the fastest growing style of tequila according to Nielsen data. The newest brand to get in on the Cristalino trend is Mijenta.

Read more
You may not dislike IPAs as much as you think — you’ve just tried the wrong type
There's much more to the IPA than bitter hop bombs
Beer

The IPA has been described as the cilantro of the beer world. It’s assumed by some novice drinkers that you either love it or hate it. On one hand, it’s one of the most popular beer styles in the American craft world. It’s loved by many drinkers for its liberal use of hops and fresh, crushable flavor profile.

But haters of the style dislike it because they have an assumption that all IPA beers are aggressively hopped and uncomfortably bitter. While there are IPAs that fit that criterion (and fans of that style can’t get enough of them), there are also a handful of other types of IPAs to fit any palate.
The IPA stigma

Read more