Do you know which cocktail belongs in which glass?

Did you also blink three times when we recently asked you to pour the fantastic batch cocktail Cherry El Capitan into a Nick & Nora glass? Well, I did when I first saw the original recipe. ‘What kind of glass is that?’ I wondered. The internet, of course, had the answer. And if you’re wondering which other cocktails officially belong in which glasses, we’ve listed a few more here.

Of course, if you’re still a fan of a Blue Curaçao cocktail in a jam jar, go right ahead. But sometimes you may want to take a slightly more traditional or classic approach, or you might simply enjoy knowing which glass is intended for which cocktail. So here goes:

Long drink/highball

What is generally called a long drink glass in the Dutch hospitality industry is known in English as a ‘highball’ glass (many cocktail terms are simply used in English in the Netherlands, by the way). A whiskey highball is also the name of a cocktail, and an easy one at that: 1 part whiskey to 2 or 3 parts ginger ale. The highball glass is tall because these cocktails almost always contain ice cubes.

Closely related is the Collins glass, which is just as narrow but slightly taller. The cocktail police may come knocking now, but I believe a long drink/highball and a Collins glass are fairly interchangeable, so you don’t need to buy both. Other examples of cocktails served in these glasses include the John Collins, the Americano and the Pimm’s Cup.

Tumbler

A tumbler is a low glass with a larger diameter than a highball. You’re probably picturing a standard whiskey glass, and of course it can hold more than just a strong whiskey with or without ice. A negroni is often served in a tumbler, as is a Dark & Stormy. An Old Fashioned glass is also a tumbler, and officially, of course, it’s meant for the equally named, decidedly grown-up cocktail.

The martini glass that is slowly being replaced by…

With its iconic V-shape, this glass is impossible to imagine the classic cocktail repertoire without. But apparently the martini glass is losing popularity among some bartenders. You can’t swirl anything around in it, and at the slightest movement you spill the contents over the rim. What do they prefer to serve a drink like a martini in?

In a coupe: that champagne glass that is suitable for all kinds of purposes, but actually not for champagne, because its width makes all those precious bubbles disappear quickly, along with those elegant aromas… But for drinks that are shaken or stirred with ice in the shaker and served without ice in the glass (the martini!), the coupe shape, with its slightly inward-curving rim, is ideal.

The Nick & Nora glass

The Nick & Nora glass takes its unusual name from the eponymous characters in the film The Thin Man. The lead characters in this 1930s detective film are passionate cocktail lovers, and the design of the glasses reflects the classic style of that era. The shape sits somewhere between a coupe and a small wine glass, and thanks to the stem, you avoid cold hands while also not warming up your cocktail.

The party squad

And then, of course, there’s a whole range of cheerful glasses that the slightly less serious cocktails always seem to end up in, and which also do wonders for the party atmosphere: tiki glasses or mugs (often engraved with Polynesian-style masks) for wildly colored tropical concoctions, the hurricane glass (large and pear-shaped on a short stem) for the much-loved piña colada, and margarita glasses (coupe-shaped with an extra ‘indentation’ above the stem) for margaritas that make you want to hang from the chandeliers.

Whichever cocktail and accompanying glass you choose, take the time to find out what you genuinely enjoy, learn a little about how to make it, be well prepared for the holidays with those batch cocktails, or leave it to the super pros at, for example, SuperLyan and order a cocktail box for home! Cheers!

Also read:

• Just do it: whisky with ice
• 5 quarantine-proof cocktails
• Why rum and cola is one of the best cocktail classics