Glassware

Two very different red wines from the same valley call for two very different glasses. Ignore that, and you give away part of the aroma: Petit Rouge is light and fruity, Fumin is dense and tannic, and a single all-purpose glass can hardly do justice to both.

For Petit Rouge and Torrette, a medium-sized glass with a slender bowl is enough. The opening can stay narrow, since the wine needs little air to open up, and too wide a glass would let the delicate cherry fruit escape before it reaches the nose. Sixteen degrees Celsius is plenty as a serving temperature.

Fumin, on the other hand, needs room. A rounder glass with a large surface area lets enough oxygen reach the wine so the hard young tannins can soften and the fruit can emerge from the dense color. Served too cool, it comes across as closed and bitter. Eighteen degrees opens it up noticeably more than sixteen.

With Fumin, decanting is also worthwhile, even in young vintages—unusual for a wine that's often only two or three years old. Half an hour of contact with air turns a closed, almost smoky nose into an open bouquet of blackberry and mountain herbs. After that, even a young vintage feels round rather than angular.

With Petite Arvine, the opposite rule applies. Its aromas of citrus and salty minerality can hardly tolerate warmth. So it belongs in the glass cooler than most white wines, around nine degrees Celsius, served in a slender white wine glass that concentrates the freshness rather than dispersing it. Treat it like a heavy Chardonnay, and you'll end up with a wine that suddenly tastes dull.