The Importance of Chilling Your Glassware!
If you are shaking or stirring a cocktail with ice, you want it to be cold, really cold. There’s nothing better than that first icy cold sip of a Martini, it’s clean, elegant, it delights the palate, and the sub-zero temperature is a big reason for this. It is super important (especially for stirred cocktails and cocktails served up) to serve your cocktails well below 0°C and to keep them below freezing for as long as possible, and the best way to ensure this is serving your drinks in chilled glassware. To prove how important it is to chill your glassware, we decided to conduct an experiment.
In this experiment, 2 identical Manhattans were made. One Manhattan was poured into a glass that wasn’t chilled, the other poured into a glass that was chilled. The specs for each Manhattan was 45ml Rye Whiskey, 22.5ml Sweet Vermouth and 3 dashes Angostura Bitters. Each drink was stirred with the same amount of ice and was stirred consistently for exactly 30 seconds. They had the same initial volume, same dilution percentage and same final volume.
The non-chilled glass was sitting at 17°C (room temp) prior to the drink being poured in. The chilled glass spent 25 minutes in the freezer and got down to around 1°C.
After each drink was poured into their respective glassware, their initial temperature was measured, as well as their temperature at 2 minutes, 5 minutes, 10 minutes and 20 minutes.
Initial Temperature:
NC: -1.3°C
C: -3.4°C
After 2 minutes:
NC: 0.6°C
C: -3.6°C
After 5 minutes:
NC: 1.8°C
C: -2°C
After 10 minutes:
NC: 4.4°C
C: 1.3°C
After 20 minutes:
NC: 8.2°C
C: 6°C
Based off this data, you can see the drastic differences in the temperature of the two cocktails. The widest discrepancy taking place at the 5 minute mark, with a range of 3.8°C between the two drinks.
There’s a few points that are important to note, firstly the initial temperature. Even though both cocktails were stirred to the same temperature in the mixing glass, the Manhattan in the chilled glass was 2.1°C colder than the other when their initial temperatures were measured. This is going to be the temperature of the drink when you take that first sip, and we all know how important first impressions are! Another interesting observation was how well the chilled glass Manhattan kept it’s cool after the 2 minute mark. The non-chilled glass cocktail basically started warming up as soon as it was poured into the glass, reaching a temperature above 0°C after 2 minutes, whereas the chilled glass cocktail remained below zero for the first 5 minutes. After 20 minutes those two lines on the graph get a lot closer, as both drink’s temperatures have less of a difference, but if you take more than 20 minutes to drink your Manhattan there is something wrong.
As I always like to say, the best way to enjoy a cocktail is swiftly!
