Plonk or Petrus? Taking the right wine to parties is a social minefield
William Sitwell prefers to squirrel away the good stuff – but wouldn’t dare offer you a bottle of ‘the devil’s merlot’
I’ll never forget the time it came round again. Perhaps it was what finally forced my hand to leave Northamptonshire. It was a bottle of Chilean merlot. And this was before I’d seen that seminal wine film Sideways (“I am not drinking merlot!” screams the protagonist throughout). A wine from the devil’s wine cellar? Worse. At least, that’s what we central players in the social whirl of Northants presumably thought. Because, of course, no one was opening it.
I first spotted it one evening on the kitchen counter of a friend’s house, as we sipped wine at the start of a dinner party.
A few weeks later and that same friend was arriving at our door. In his hand was the proverbial bottle, which he thrust forward with a chummy smile. “I’m not opening that muck,” I remarked. “It’s OK,” he joked. “This one’s going round the county.”
A few days later, I wished the merlot well as I sent it further on its way through the rural East Midlands by donating it to the village charity raffle. I never saw it again – but I can guarantee it will have done several more rounds.
That one, £7-odd vessel exemplified a huge social dilemma: the anxietyinducing, faux-pas hot coals territory of taking a bottle to a dinner party. It certainly brings out the worst in me. For whether I am giving or receiving a bottle, emotions flow and judgements cascade.
Perhaps I am at my most Machiavellian as the bringer. Before we clamber into the car (always late; children howling; wife gnashing teeth that I’m rushing her; both of us asking why we accepted when a Saturday in offered the prospect of a night of fish pie, drinking and telly) you’ll find me in my little cellar.
In there, I weigh up the prospect of dinner and the sort of people hosting. Do they know anything about wine, or, like some of my friends, are they barely able to discern the difference between red and white? If they know about wine then they’ll have organised a good batch of matching whites and reds. My wine will then be a gift, to be snaffled and opened by them at some future occasion. So, as it’s no one’s birthday, for them it will be a modest bottle that won’t insult my reputation, but neither will it be too good for me to miss.
If they are the more ignorant variety, I’ll pluck out a fine bottle of white burgundy, cellar chilled, ready to drink. The ensuing catastrophe being, of course, that on arrival I see they have a plan: a glass of very
As a host, I will make it quite clear to my guest we will not be drinking their bottle of muck
inadequate white is thrust into my hand and my precious bottle is snaffled away and hidden. Which is precisely what I’ll do if someone brings me something really decent to one of our dinner parties. I’ll always have a plan of what we’re going to drink. That way if someone brings a terrible bottle I’ll make it very clear that we’re drinking what I’m offering, so there’s no prospect of us having to open their muck. And similarly it means that no fellow wine snob will out-bottle me. “Thank you so much,” I’ll say, when I spot that they’ve brought something rather special, before hurrying it to a secret corner.
I’ve now resolved to deal with the whole shebang with thirsty bombast. A few weeks back I arrived at a pal’s house with three magnums: of rosé, red and white. I brought my own corkscrew and opened all three.