No one likes to tell other affluent white guys what to do more than affluent white guys.
Remember all those king angry dinners? There is no new thing under the sun.
3 Likes
Love this community and good to see the opinions on what the aggregate thought or lack of thought is behind this wine dinner. Dallas is a funny city and there are lot of people with $ who donāt always know how to spend it. I donāt think the NYC Carbone would do this. i could be wrong. Iād say this dinner is analogous to buying a luxury item that mostly just screams its name brand more than it exudes quality.
The Grill in NYC (same company) did a similar dinner with the full lineup of 2020 Leflaive and 2014 DRC earlier this year.
I agree with everything you said except the not going if invited bit. Never had any of those wines, and very unlikely to have them in the future. I probably would have declined at least 2 courses and several wines and focused on the rest.
1 Like
agreed the reaction to this has got to be one of the weirdest ones Iāve seen on this board.
itās a five course dinner with 11 wines with maybe 2oz per person
Iāve seen some of the trash food people eat on this board at their dinners- Carbone is better than a lot of it.
2 Likes
1 Like
Well, it aināt Pioneer Chicken. 
Sorry didnāt see your post.
1 Like
What was the price
1 Like
Itās a pretty strong line up of bucket list wines from in general excellent vintages.
The food matches do not appeal to me, but thatās me.
I can see why people who have the means would attend.
2 Likes
4,500$
2 Likes
For my part anyway, a number of factors go into the equation- bottle count being less important than many others.
Some others have referenced the Acker Auction dinners, for example. I attended several of those toward the end of their heyday, and it was not uncommon for there to be 50+ wines on the table worth a whole lot more than $100 a bottle. With a little advanced physical preparation, I can attend an evening like that and handle up to about 60 different wines and make good detailed notes.
The key difference is that at those dinners, when you are sitting with the right people anyway, the wines were either mature or- if younger- were brought for a specific purpose. A good example was one night where a bottle of 2006 Ramonet Montrachet (this was in 2009) was among my brings because I knew a 1996 was going to be there plus I knew from other 06 Ramonet tastings at release that the wine was likely to show well in youth (which is rare for their Montrachet and Batard while Bienvenue and Chevalier can be very approachable at release.) Also, you are there for 6-7 hours, and longer on nights where the venue is forgiving about letting you hang around while they close down. Plus the food options are arranged for prolonged snacking. Subtle details that would be very unusual at a tasting put on by a restaurant.
I will freely admit this is very much a subjective question though. While I have my own opinion, given the physical preparation required to tackle a 50+ wine dinner alone, I am loath to question or disagree with opinions that diverge from my own on this one. Any time you have more than a handful of legendary wines in a single setting, a number of minor factors can determine whether it was a great night or felt like a complete waste.
1 Like
Embarrassment of riches IMHO.
Too many wines to truly āappreciateā them allā¦
Reminds me of WB dinners Iāve attended.
Cheers
3 Likes
I love living in Dallas, and unless I go back to Manhattan in the next 12 months, I will probably finish out my career and retire here.
But when it comes to organizing wine tastings or even allowing myself to be drawn into certain circles of tasters, I have gotten very particular about guest lists and also about opening prized bottles.
I think some of it is the incredible ramp-up in prices in recent years and would be true in any city- notably with the leech crowd who will show up with uninvited guests and/or bring crap bottles while taking massive pours of the best wines in the room.
However a new danger has emerged- and that is the high dollar collector who has not done their homework and both purchases and pours indiscriminately. I have had a lot of high end wine in the last 3 years here that was mildly to moderately heat damaged, as well as bottles that were not properly decanted ahead and were not showing nearly as well as they would have if there had been any left to drink 2-3 hours later.
Part of it is failing to understand that having a lot of money to spend does not compensate for a lack of the knowledge and direct experience that is required to learn how wine reacts to aeration or to be able to spot a wine that is ātastyā but not as good as it should be due to condition.
The other part is the two-fold peril of purchasing in the secondary market today. 15 years ago, we were worried about fakes. That is far less a worry with the auction market now. But there is greater danger of provenance issues because so many high end wines get resold over and over and over again- and often transported by the least expensive means possible adding significant risk of minor to moderate exposure. I can look at most bottles and on sight tell the signs of significant damage depending on the winery and era, but mild to moderate exposure damage that does not affect label or capsule color- among other things- is almost impossible to detect in an unopened bottle. Additionally, reselling wine is now a cottage industry. Restauranteurs, storage facilities, retail employees, that guy down the street who knows people etc.- there are a lot of amateurs in the game of reselling now, and vast quantities of high end wine change hands regularly without ever being inspected by an appraiser, auction house or other educated steward of the marketplace.
2 Likes
We regularly see members here post about events more extravagant than this, often with little-to-no criticism posted in response, so itās a little surprising to see this much criticism of this dinner.
To be clear, Iām not saying the criticism isnāt warranted, but at the end of the day itās just opinion. If this is how people want to spend their money, then so be it.
2 Likes
I actually think these are really great. This is how you do an over the top dinner.
Wines that are mature or younger vintages that are likely to be showing well,
A good sense of structure/theme for comparisons
A great emphasis on protein- with a strong presence of seafood
Little to no presence of pasta
As long as the wines are properly decanted and there is a good amount of time for each course, I would pay big money to attend either of these.
1 Like
Although there seems to be an undercurrent of this being an event for rich blowhards, in a sense, this is kind of more democratic than the offline we normally read about.
You donāt have to have been collecting the right wines for a long time, have a bunch of friends who have been, have some social arrangement around sharing wines like this, have arrangements with a top restaurant.
Sure, you have to write a big check, but otherwise, anyone can just have this experience. Itās a lot more democratic. I guess that seems tacky to some people? Like itās too āunearned?ā Anyway, Iām just saying there is another way to look at it.
People spend that much on tickets to the Super Bowl or to Taylor Swift, or to upgrade their international flight to first class. Iād take the dinner over those things.
11 Likes
Obviously, with a tasting of that caliber and with the way dinners usually go (lighter fare to heavier fare) you canāt pull the classic multiple bottles trick at home: great bottles early, good bottles throughout and less expensive bottles to close the night. So it normally ends up with the last bottles being less analyzed. But, there is some fun in decadence. You just need to plan for a good run the next morning and a healthier rest of the week. As for the food, even though I abhor wasting food, you donāt have to lick clean all your plates. And stay away from dinner rolls! 
As we will prove next month.
Charleston is always too much wine, WAY too much wine, but each attendee can be disciplined about portion control (or not). Generally the food is manageable, but one dinner last year was definitely too much. I do my best to linger over each wine, and I always write tasting notes. By the final day, I am DONE, bet recovery is quick.
I do, however, appreciate the posters commenting on the number of wines at the event, and certainly the concerns about the amount, and richness of the food.
I have no problem with food/wine orgies, but donāt want to see product, especially animal protein, wasted.
2 Likes