“Oh, how thoughtful!” says your host, looking at the bottle of wine you hold in your hand.
You stand there in the doorway. You wonder, is that smile forced? Or is it overly sincere, one of those “I so lucked out with this guest’s gift” types of grin?
Either way, you are offering what you think is a pretty good bottle. Maybe you picked it up at the supermarket five minutes earlier, or spent a great deal of time, thought, and yes, money, at a high-end wine shop.
Either way, the look on your host’s face makes you feel you’ve done something wrong. Either you bought a wine the host considers inappropriately cheap, or something so good that the lip-smacking host is planning to lock it up in the cellar without opening it to let you take a sip of your hard-won prize.
Welcome to Thanksgiving Day 2009, a modern era where, thanks to magazines like Food & Wine and Internet shows like Wine TV, everyone feels themselves to be critics and/or collectors.
So what are the rules of engagement this holiday season? How low can you go, in terms of a hostess gift? Should you inquire about what will be served so as to bring an appropriate wine for pairing? Or should you not expect the host to open the bottle in your presence?
“The quality of wine I bring has a lot to do about how seriously the guest is into wine,” said my friend Katie, when I asked the question. “For some, only the best will do — a recognized producer and vintage. For others, anything goes. They prefer the lower-end, under-$15 wines they are used to and wouldn’t even know how to appreciate the ‘good stuff.’”
And Katie is right. Often, the more expensive a wine, such as those from the region of Burgundy, the more it smells of “barnyard.” An inexperienced wine connoisseur might think the wine is flawed or just plain “icky,” whereas to an experienced taster, the "stinkier" the wine, the better its quality.
Article comments
1 - Kt
Hi - great suggestions! Especially about bringing a wine that you like. Your host, no matter how much an enthusiast, will appreciate the gesture. If not, he or she is not much of a host.