OK - who here wrote to Dear Amy??

From today's Chicago Tribune: (love the answer!)

Dear Amy: My wife and I were recently invited to have dinner with an old friend of hers, who recently moved to our city. As a consideration, I brought two excellent and expensive bottles of pinot noir, which can be served with just about any food. To my astonishment the wine was gratefully received and then not served. The wine that was served was ordinary at best, and I couldn't help but feel slighted throughout the evening.When I mentioned it to my wife on the way home, it led to an argument. My wife claims that we were not asked to bring anything and that the wine was a gift. She told me to suck it up. I say, come on, if I have to lower my standards to that degree, our friendship with this couple will not develop, and we need to educate them a little bit in the social graces. I would chalk it up to a lesson learned and move on, but this is an important relationship to my wife. Please inform people some "gifts" are to be shared.

— I Know I'm Right

Dear Right: It doesn't seem to have occurred to you that your wife's friend assessed the situation and decided to serve the wine you deserved.

Ouch!

(Good answer from Amy.)

Yes, an instance of true jerkdom.

Simple: if you want to drink a wine you bring to someone else's house to dinner, you clear it beforehand.
Otherwise it's for their cellar (if they so wish).

End of story.

Best regards,
Alex R.

So you want a gift to be equated to a BYO ?

It is not at all rare to want to share a specific wine with a friend.

When invited, you express this wish, and then bring the bottle (unless the host says," thanks but I've already planned all the wines and the food to go with it").

Bringing a special wine to dinner is not something to do with just anybody, but if we're talking about friends, and ones who like wine like you do, then why not?

Arranging things beforehand also means that the host can plan his other wines as well as the food.

The obnoixious person in the agony aunt column didn't think to check beforehand, which explains what happened.
Like so many complications between people, it stems from poor communication.

A more delicate issue is bringing a wine as a gift, and then the host or hostess feels obliged to serve it (sometimes upsetting the order of a carefully orchestrated meal and making people drink more than they ought to).
You can get around this by saying "here, this for your cellar".
Last night I was invited out and brought a great Sauternes. It was not chilled, so I didn't think it was necessary to say that. But the hostess gushed and immediately put it into the fridge.
Fortunately, she did not open it in the end.

Best regards,
Alex R.

I was recently asked to bring wine for a dinner party. I purchased four bottles of really nice wine and, being a little bit of a jerk, I opened them myself. Yes, I wanted them to breath a little but I admit that I aslo didn't want to leave any unopened bottles there. This is somewhat different than the opening of this post since I was asked to bring the wine but I know how the guy feels.

Great response.

I'm with everyone else, if you haven't cleared it with host/hostess first, any bottle you bring is a gift to the house, zero obligation to serve with dinner.

I will say that there is one situation where I feel a little differently. I sometimes go to potlucks, where people bring dishes, and sometimes bottles. I've brought something nice, and then felt awkward pushing to open my bottle when there are 6 open bottles of mostly plonk. So my solution is to carry something that I double-decanted, because it "needed air" or " I wanted to get rid of sediment before traveling."

Now that's a great response, Dale.

[Jenise]

Great response.

I'm with everyone else, if you haven't cleared it with host/hostess first, any bottle you bring is a gift to the house, zero obligation to serve with dinner.

I will say that there is one situation where I feel a little differently. I sometimes go to potlucks, where people bring dishes, and sometimes bottles. I've brought something nice, and then felt awkward pushing to open my bottle when there are 6 open bottles of mostly plonk. So my solution is to carry something that I double-decanted, because it "needed air" or " I wanted to get rid of sediment before traveling."

Ditto about the agreement. And I love your solution: I'm going to copy this!