Wine pairings: what order to go on this list?

I’m having friends over for 45-day aged prime rib and to help clear some wines from storage. There will be six drinkers, myself included, with varying degrees of interest in wine: one’s a beer gal, two usually prefer liquor, two have a slowly growing interest in wines, and then there’s me.

To start, we will have '05 & '06 late disgorged Domaine Carneros Le Reve bubbly, then jump straight to the reds.

Please help me put these wines in the order you would suggest serving them, assuming that by the time we get to the bottom of the list we might be too drunk to tell the difference from Franzia. While I can definitely open multiple bottles at a time, a.) I don’t want to open more than we can drink, and b.) I don’t have enough glasses for flights.

The options are:
'07 Pegau CdP
'08 Anderson’s Conn Valley Estate cab (2 bottles)
'08 Lamborn Family Vineyards cab
'08 Lillian Winery syrah
'09 Lillian Winery syrah
'10 Krupp Brothers M5 cab

Much obliged!

It sounds like a lot of wine, and especially a lot of huge reds, but if all six of you are drinking and drink a good amount and/or it’s over a long evening, it could be a good number.

I guess I’d probably serve the three cabs together before and during the steak, then the three Rhones together with dessert and into the later evening. Maybe you can pour one at a time during each threesome flight, so the gals are trying the same thing at the same time and can talk about it and compare reactions.

Sounds like a blast, have fun with it.

Im a big wine drinker so please dont take this as a negative. It doesnt really matter. While they have distinct differences between them, all of those are huge and young, so after a few glasses they will be hard to tell appart. I would serve them in whatever order makes more sense to you. Probably cabs together and rhones together. Or blind them and see if people can pick the rhones out of the bunch. Itll be fun and youll be smashed at the end anyway, those are all boozy too

The fact that it never occurred to me to group them by variety goes to show how much I’m still learning. Thanks!

Hopefully not too smashed, but we’ll see!

Out of curiosity, how long do you usually prefer to age a cab or Rhone before drinking?

Not trying to be flippant, but the answer depends upon the style of wine. Some wines, without a lot of structure built in or made in a particular style, are meant to be drunk younger. These early drinking cabs tend to be made in a style that tasters describe as “velvety” or “smooth”. But they might not age well. Some wines can also be so rich and powerful that they taste kinda one dimensional and maybe even a bit gross when they’re young. A food analogy might beef stock vs beef demi glacé

Your lineup is just fine, but those wine will change a lot over the next decade as they start to lose baby fat, have tannins integrate, and trade pure fruit for more secondary flavors. It’s a biggish lineup, but there’s no wrong way to enjoy wine as long as you have good friends to share it with. Drink lots of water that night.

Bingo. I figured that since I like my wines in this style, and it’s not likely to stay that way for another decade, then lots of hot beef and good friends it is.

As for hydration, does it count if we mix some with the wine?

I would look at the alcohol of each wine and go lowest to highest. also there is one bottle you have 2 of I would hold the second bottle until the end so if you don’t need it, you have something to remember the night. Also I would open and decant (open and vigorously pour into another vassal, you can pour it back into the bottle to serve if you want) the Pegau at least an hour or 2 before you want to serve it, it’s a tannic monster. You can use a clean glass vase of pitcher if you don’t have a decanter.

So that’s how lords decanted their wines during Feudalism! I kid I kid.

Thanks for the heads up! I have a dusty decanter somewhere.

Vassal, not so much, unless you count Jerome.

How did it go, Betty?

Spellcheck addds hammer to alt our lifes!