Dinners
Join us for one of our fine dining evenings. A perfect way to find out more about a specific wine region or style, or to simply relax over a more leisurely affair absorbing the knowledge of your expert host over several courses of the finest food and wine.
Food will be prepared in-house by our fantastic team, with Head Chef Stewart Turner at the helm; while our range of wine specialists will guide you through the glass in your hand.
When is a wine ready to drink?
We provide drinking windows for all our wines. Alongside the drinking windows there is a bottle icon and a maturity stage. Bear in mind that the best time to drink a wine does also depend on your taste.
Not ready
These wines are very young. Whilst they're likely to have lots of intense flavours, their acidity or tannins may make them feel austere. Although it isn't "wrong" to drink these wines now, you are likely to miss out on a lot of complexity by not waiting for them to mature.
Ready - youthful
These wines are likely to have plenty of fruit flavours still and, for red wines, the tannins may well be quite noticeable. For those who prefer younger, fruitier wines, or if serving alongside a robust meal, these will be very enjoyable. If you choose to hold onto these wines, the fruit flavours will evolve into more savoury complexity.
Ready - at best
These wines are likely to have a beautiful balance of fruit, spice and savoury flavours. The acidity and tannins will have softened somewhat, and the wines will show plenty of complexity. For many, this is seen as the ideal time to drink and enjoy these wines. If you choose to hold onto these wines, they will become more savoury but not necessarily more complex.
Ready - mature
These wines are likely to have plenty of complexity, but the fruit flavours will have been almost completely replaced by savoury and spice notes. These wines may have a beautiful texture at this stage of maturity. There is lots to enjoy when drinking wines at this stage. Most of these wines will hold in this window for a few years, though at the very end of this drinking window, wines start to lose complexity and decline.
Book
Description
Our historic Napoleon Cellar will provide an auspicious setting for a special blind-tasting dinner recreating the late Steven Spurrier’s legendary 1976 Judgement of Paris. The event famously pitted the most celebrated wines of Burgundy and Bordeaux against those of California, marking a turning point for American winemakers and sparking a stratospheric rise to fame.
Over nearly 50 years, the reputation and quality of Californian wines have flourished and this dinner will highlight those wines that we may now consider to be the modern greats. As in 1976, all wines will be served blind, and we will tally up your votes to see which come out on top.
Though the exact wines cannot be revealed, we will serve a pair each of Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah wines, with a bespoke four-course menu to accompany. The French wines will include a Premier Cru white Burgundy, Grand Cru red Burgundy, First Growth Bordeaux and equivalent level red from the Rhône Valley. The USA will be represented by a Chardonnay winemaker that has worked at Château Petrus, one of North America’s most revered producers of Pinot Noir, a 99-point Cabernet Sauvignon from the Harlan family portfolio and one of Napa’s smallest production Syrahs of which just 300 cases are made.
To relieve any fears as to the quality of wines on show, we will of course only be serving you the very best, with the average cost per bottle at £300+ and the average score from The Wine Advocate at 96 points. It promises to be a truly spectacular evening, not to be missed!
Wines to be tasted: the exact line-up of wines for this dinner cannot yet be revealed.
Dress code: smart casual
Event details
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