TN: 2013 Ridge Monte Bello (USA, California, San Francisco Bay, Santa Cruz Mountains)

• 2013 Ridge Monte Bello - USA, California, San Francisco Bay, Santa Cruz Mountains (1/2/2017)
  When I arrived home from the airport last night, much to my horror, I saw an empty bottle of this sitting on my desk. My wife had a girlfriend over while I was out of town, and they decided to open a cab while watching the kids play outside. She left the empty bottle on my desk because she knows I like to track inventory in Cellar Tracker. She commented that it was “too young” but “pretty good” and her friend “really liked it”. There may have been some chips and salsa they paired this with - not sure. I later explained to my wife the cost of this bottle and read her the many glorious critic reviews that all stated to wait ten years or more before opening. Needless to say, I will be locking my wine cabinet going forward. Excellent wine, but suggest holding…under lock and key.

Posted from CellarTracker

Does your wife know mine?

And they wonder why we die first…

Ha! I’m sure most everyone has one of these stories. My wife kept giggling and saying “I love me some Ridge!” after the shock wore off. I’d sure like to try some, but I’m going to be patient.

I was just telling The Doc, my wife and her 2 girlfriends slurped down 4 bottles of Kim Crawford at a tennis match I took them to last night. They had “better” options but wanted “Malborough”. Perhaps that is code for something. So the pain was not bad.

I’d cry if they drank my Monte Bello.

I think I told the story on the Carlisle thread but over holidays I came home and wife had friends over while I was working. There’s a few empties, nothing I didn’t mind sharing, and then I spied the 13 Sierra Mar Syrah just uncorked. I swiped a Zalto Bordeaux stem and stealth-pour a very manly-sized glass for daddy and retire to upstairs office.

Later I heard them wondering how they drank thru that last bottle so quickly!

The best method I’ve found to prevent this is to put stick notes on the bottles in my wine fridge that my wife can open without worry. Anything with a yellow sticky note is fine (or sometimes I have a box next to the fridge with fair game wines.)

We have a separate under the counter wine fridge in the kitchen, where I put stuff she can open without worrying about cost. Since we were out of cab in the kitchen, she got to wandering and went into the large storage cabinet in my office. I’m now on the hunt for some $20-30 cabs I can stock in the kitchen fridge!

I’m sorry for your loss, but this story absolutely made my morning.

For over forty years, I’ve been steering SWMBO away from plonk and toward the good stuff. Negotiating a purchase is much easier if I can pitch it to her as being within her zone of appreciation. Occasionally, a bottle will fall prey to premature opening when I’m not around, but I figure that to be a minor cost in the bigger scheme of things.

About 6 years ago, my ex’s dad had a similar situation. His wife was having a friend (and local painter) paint their guest bathroom some hideous shade of textured green.

Fast forward, his wife wanted to tip her something and knew “she likes red wine.” Goes into the cellar and grabs a bottle and gives it away with a smile.

He notices (like 2 weeks later) that there’s a gap in the cellar: 2000 Mouton. I thought we were going to have to call the National Guard.

This is why I have a “friends and family” shelf in the wine cellar. Wine can disappear from that shelf with no questions asked. If they want something else they are generally more than welcome to have something very nice; I just need to be consulted first to make sure that certain specific bottles aren’t taken. The consultation also usually allows me to pick something that will best suit the occasion and tastes of the recipient.

In a related funny story there was a night that a bottle of some white wine was grabbed from my cellar and I was told the next day that the partakers got a bit happy on a single glass of wine each - and that oddly there were only two glasses of wine in the bottle. “I thought wine bottles held more.” Well, if you fill Riedel Burg stems nearly to the brim then yeah, there’s only two glasses of wine in a bottle (or less).

This also made my day. I am currently stuck in an elevator at my hospital, half an hour late to a busy clinic with 25 patients scheduled, and have been here for close to an hour with the Keystone fire department outside. As a hand surgeon i keep telling people to stop putting their hands in the little crack in the elevator door… at least I can also read about others misfortune with the one bar of cell service I have behind all this steel…

I wish my wife would do that sometime, it would be a relief. When I am working late and tell her to pick a bottle for the evening, she is afraid to because she doesn’t want to open something too expensive or not ready. It is even worse when one of her girlfriends come over. I have told her there are bottles with neck tags that should generally not be opened miscellaneously, but if she does, it isn’t a big deal. As long as she doesn’t cook with it.

We have a section for sub $20 drinkers and then the rest of the cellar. It will all be consumed at some point, cheap or expensive, and she helps pay for it, so she has the right.

Like others I had something similar happen once or twice years ago. What started out as some ground rules on what were safe for her to drink evolved over time to where we basically have his and her cellars. She has an entire wall devoted to her wine. Not only has this stopped her from opening something I am saving but as an added benefit she buys most of her own wine now as well.

I see, your fault for not keeping the kitchen fridge stocked not your wife’s fault…I see a box of Ridge Estate Cab with a replacement Monte Bello showing up there in the near future .

I have to ask, are you serious about this? It seems very insulting to me. I can almost imagine a “Mad Men” era conversation that goes “Silly women, they don’t know what they’re doing around wine. It would be in everybody’s best interest if we just locked it up and let the men handle it.” I know you didn’t say that, I don’t mean to put words in your mouth, that is just the first thought that popped into my head. I would think there is a better, more respectful way to deal with special (or just too young) bottles of wine. One that doesn’t imply a lack of trust in your loved ones.

My wife is well aware of the cost of wines we own as she has as much a hand as I in buying them. If she wanted to drink a 2013 Montebello, hope she enjoys it.

I simply see a reason to fire up the MacBook and purchase 3more of the same. Everybody wins.