There is much more to drinking wine than just opening the bottle and quaffing off its contents. In fact, if you drink wine out of the bottle you run the chances of being called crazy, alcoholic or a complete insult to oenology. How, then, is wine supposed to be drunk?

The art of drinking wine lies in subtlety and accuracy. Wine is a complex mixture of colors, fragrances and flavors that needs to be matched with the right occasion, food and tableware. Unluckily for the beginner, there are no hard-and-fast rules on any of these three subjects, but a gross violation of established conventions will lead to many horrified glances from people who "know their wine". But luckily for the beginner, the broad guidelines to these conventions are quite clear.

First of all, a wine should always be slightly sweeter and slightly fuller in the bouquet than the food it is paired with. Pairing champagne with dark chocolate, for instance, is a strict no-no. Common foods that are eaten with wines include meat, cheese and occasionally chocolate.

Typically, red wines are fuller-bodied and sweeter than white wines, so these go better with slightly aged cheeses and red meat. The sweeter red wines are also referred to as "dessert wines", and these can be eaten with dark chocolate. White wines, on the other hand, go well with delicately prepared poultry and soft cheeses, which will not overwhelm the subtle, elusive fragrance of the wine itself.

Secondly, pick your glass according to your wine. Standard-issue wineglasses usually have a 150-200mL capacity, but should not be filled to more than half their volume capacity. A good wineglass should feel stable in your hands even when it is full of liquid, while an inferior build will tend to topple over due to the heavy top. Some wineglasses look like bowls mounted on stems, while others have the characteristic tulip shape. The tulip shape is favored over the others because it allows the fragrance of the wine to be concentrated and gently wafted over to the nostrils. When you swirl your wine around in the glass, it coats the inner surface and then evaporates, so that you can enjoy all notes of its complex fragrance. Since red wines have strong flavors, they are usually drunk in glasses with wide bowls. White wines are drunk in smaller, taller glasses, culminating in the champagne flute - meant for the most delicate of white wines, so that their flavor gets concentrated in a very small space.

Everyone has to begin some time, and wine connoisseurs can be very forthcoming if they see a discerning beginner. So don't hesitate to pick up a young red wine the next time you're in a wine shop, and begin your journey to wine nirvana!