As an English person of near middle age, a primary concern of mine is the fear of being considered rude. The incoming festive period is ripe for politesse pitfalls, none more fraught than properly thanking a host who has slaved long or spent big, perhaps both, for the pleasure of your company.
One recent saving grace was thinking ahead to a Thanksgiving soirée whose hosts were food lovers but not huge drinkers, and buying them a good bottle of olive oil instead (limited edition Odysea, having gone out with the intention of splurging on Nuñez de Prado - but if you know about olive oil inflation, you’ll know why I didn’t). I also dropped a fiver on those truffle crisps, which I’m too tight to ever buy for myself.
It wasn’t a surprise to hear the Waitrose Food and Drink Report usher in a bottle of olive oil as a more suitable dinner party gift than wine this week, along with other popular pantry staples such as nuts, olives, honey and even fancy salt. House & Garden has also covered the rise of gifting oil over wine, explaining that it’s a genuine present rather than a contribution to the evening’s entertainment - and raising the thornier topic of whether gifting wine might even be rude.
Has taking wine to a party become political? What is wrong with a decent bottle? Once the de rigueur gift from any good guest, wine has fallen out of favour as our drinking habits change. While some drinkers love to show off their Aldi bargains, others only drink natural wines - and the rest won’t decide if they’re on Merlot or mushroom oil until they’ve consulted their tarot cards.
It’s also, I believe, becoming trickier to choose wine to suit the host or event as we become more knowledgeable about grapes and winemaking regions, while costs soar. The other problem is that so many people don’t drink at all, and it’s impossible to keep up with who is or who isn’t.
Whether it’s actually bad manners to take wine along to a party is a bolder proposition. Few people are likely to think you rude for pressing a bottle of something cold and bubbly into their hands, unless they’re six months sober. Do please keep bringing wine over to mine. But it is more thoughtful to think of something not meant to be opened and glugged right away. Especially given that with wine, you’ll usually consume your own gift.
This supports Waitrose’s claim that people who do bring wine are more likely to turn up with a box or a can. Sales of non-bottled wine are up 25 per cent year on year, with cans alone up 36 per cent. These kinds of packaging are more environmentally friendly, and permit easier portion control.
But none of this is as rude as another of my bugbears, which is turning up with a specific dish or course you haven’t been asked to bring. When I get together with food and drink obsessed friends, we’ll often divvy out the courses or bring along new finds to share.
But if I’ve planned and cooked a meal myself and someone shows up with courses they want to insert into my menu, it can throw my carefully balanced design off kilter, and is kind of annoying. You can cook when you invite me to your home.
I’m so glad the legendary American cook and hostess Ina Garten shares my views on this. Garten recently said she agrees that wine has become a trickier gift, in case the host thinks they are obliged to open it to serve with the meal, while bringing a particular course is equally problematic.
“I wouldn’t bring cheese,” she said. “Because they feel like they need to serve the cheese with the dinner.”
She, too, advises taking high-end pantry products such as granola or coffee. Still, take care out there - earlier this year I took special coffee as a gift to a place I was staying the night, but on finding out the following morning they had no coffee, ended up drinking my own gift. I’m still worrying about this months later. Though at the time getting my coffee hit clearly won out over my etiquette anxiety.
The truth is, whether it’s wine, oil, or an impossibly hip-and-hardto-get condiment made by MBA grads with Pedro Pascal moustaches from their mother’s Chelsea mews, I won’t ever think someone rude for turning up on my doorstep with their hands full.
The problem guests are those who come with nothing at all.
