The Best Gifts for Wine Lovers, According to Sommeliers

Every single one of our sommeliers had a recommendation for their favorite glassware, but the pick from Chelsea Coleman, the co-owner of San Diego must-visits including wine bar the Rose, makes a particularly easy gift, given that it’s hard to find better-quality glasses at such a reasonable price. “Glassware makes a difference but you don’t have to go crazy with it,” says Coleman. “Crate & Barrel manages to sell really nice glassware at reasonable prices, and these Nattie wine glasses are classy-looking at $4 each.” Whenever you’re shopping for glasses, Coleman recommends looking for designs with a broad base and tapered nose for options that will be useful across several wine styles.

Chances are a new wine bar has recently opened near you, and chances are they’re using glassware that’s petit and slightly more French in style. As the owner of the wildly popular Somerville, Massachusetts, wine bar Rebel Rebel and its retail kid sister Wild Child, Lauren Friel was on a quest for the perfect glass for a while before settling on these from Stölzle. “Being a New Englander means I have an inherent love for all things utilitarian, and the fussiness of multiple glasses for multiple wines never jived with the simplicity I craved from wine service.” For Friel, this smaller tasting glass is the silver bullet of glassware — something that brings out the best in everything from Champagne to barolo, but it’s also elegant, compact, and sturdy.”

You’ll find plenty of ideas for decanters on other lists of the best wine gifts, but our somms had other suggestions for decanting wine that’ll spare your dollars. For Scarlett Carrasco Polanco, the beverage director at Keep It Grand and EaTo (both in Minneapolis), an aerating pourer is a great way to open up a wine without using a decanter, which can be bulky and hard to clean. “I use it most often with young, tannic wines that need to be nudged along,” says Carrasco Polando. 

Meanwhile, Eater Wine Club’s November host and Atlanta pop-up chef Seung Hee Lee loves to decant young red wines in an Erlenmeyer flask — you know, the science-y ones. “I like to decant half of the bottle (and the Erlenmeyer flask lets me measure that out easily), and compare how the decanted version tastes different than the one in the bottle.” 

The wine lover in your life no doubt already owns a solid double-hinged waiter’s corkscrew, but if they’re someone who also enjoys drinking wines with a lot of years on them (we’re talking 30-plus years), the classic corkscrew won’t do. “The Durand is a total game changer,” says Portland-based sommelier Brent Braun. “It’s a corkscrew and ah-so combined into one, and it’s basically foolproof in making sure an old cork doesn’t disintegrate into a bottle when you try to open it.”

Caruke admits this is a nerdier gift, but she would be absolutely thrilled to receive a polishing cloth for all her glassware. This one from wine glass company Riedel is just the sort she’s used at the restaurants she’s worked in. “It’s not an everyday thing for me, but I like to polish if I know I’m having people over.”

While they each had their preferences for style, all the somms polled said that something to carry bottles of wine in was one of the very best accessories to have. For Liz Martinez, the director of beverage and service at Detroit’s Daxton Hotel, this leather option “not only protects my precious bottles, but it is a major conversation starter; everyone immediately covets it.” Style aside, these totes are also functional with a divider to safeguard your bottles. “Beautiful and luxurious,” says Martinez. Who wouldn’t want that?

When Chloe Grigri, owner of French Philly wine bar Le Caveau, was in France one summer, she fell in love with a wine bag that also functioned as a tabletop cooler, the ones she used to see at all the little bistros. “Food52 sells this slightly more fashionable version that I am loving right now,” says Grigri. “You can grab a bottle on-the-go and be sure it stays at temp during a dinner party.”

There are so many wine tools and gadgets out there that even the most useful can appear gimmicky at first glance. So it helps to know that Braun stands firmly behind something known as the “winesulator.” According to Braun the canteen is the best way to take wine with you, inconspicuously. “You can fill it with an entire wine bottle and it stays cold for hours, plus, the little travel plastic cups are great for the park, river, beach, or really anywhere,” he says. “And because it basically looks like a water bottle, me and my lady will often fill it up and take walks through the park while sipping right from the bottle.”

Wine is best enjoyed with food; and for wine pro Jirka Jireh, the be-all end-all pairing is an apero spread with a couple tins of fish, good olive oil, Castelvetrano olives, pickled and marinated veggies, creamy goat or cow cheeses, and some crusty bread. For the fish, she likes La Brujula. “All of the conserva made by La Brujula is delicious, but I am partial to their sardines; they just have a wow factor when you open the tin and all the sardines are beautifully stacked inside.” Jireh also loves the scallop and octopus tins from Conservas de Cambado in Galicia, but says, when in doubt, you can check out a local natural wine shop or pantry for provisions like tinned fish and good olive oils and vinegars.