Had this happen recently. Brought two Zinfandels which were gladly accepted by the host and then we were served water or soda. Lesson learned for next time.
I agree that when bringing wine then it should be considered a present.
Pour it into a decanter when you hit their driveway. That’ll get the point across.
In your situation, I would accidentally knock over my glass of Charles Shaw and say something like “whoopsa-daisy.” Then I would pour myself another glass and repeat (with a different phrase every time of course) until they were out of it and opened the bottle of wine I brought.
+1. If the dessert was brought because the guest offered - “can we bring something for dessert?”, then it’s presumed to be brought for the meal. If the same was said about the wine, they it should be poured. (This is putting aside that dessert is usually more perishable than wine.)
On the flip side, if you brought wine without its being discussed beforehand, then it’s a gift. Same would be true if you brought a box of chocolates or packaged cookies that weren’t specifically intended for dessert that night.
More broadly, the established social custom (at least in the US) is that if you are hosting a dinner you provide the food and the drink - indeed, it may be considered rude for a guest to bring food/drink to contribute to the meal, unless the arrangements are made in advance that the meal will be a joint effort (“potluck” or otherwise). Of course, in today’s world jointly prepared/supplied meals have become much more common than it once was (I’m not making a judgement), and as a result many people take a dinner invitation (whether giver or recipient) as a proposal for a jointly provided meal, resulting in awkward misunderstandings if a person’s contribution is not then served.
(FWIW, I typically serve wine from my cellar to guests, even if they bring a bottle - they are thanked for that and it goes in the cellar. It may reappear the next time they are over, however.)
Is that the solution to being served the 2 Buck Chuck or the solution to the repeated invitations from someone the OP isn’t terribly interested in socializing with?
I don’t know how to handle the second situation as I refuse to hang out with people I don’t like. If I get invited to someone’s house and I don’t want to spend time with them, I simply decline.
Let’s not forget that, to a HUGE majority of this country, Charles Shaw is considered ‘good wine’, thus anything you bring is probably similar in their mind. The thought of spending $30 or more on a bottle of wine is the furthest thing from their state of comfort, so they would fairly assume that the wine you brought is probably similarly priced, and thus similarly as desirable, as Charles Shaw.
I’m just the opposite. When I bring a wine to a geek/non-geek, I always open it. As a matter of fact, I ask for the wine opener. If it’s a geek house, they’ll open my bottle. If it’s a non-geek, I assume they have plonk. Wine is not a gift. If you bring some bakery item, would you put it away? ![[wink.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/04707e6a7bbb03e0153e349d8a9270d30e1e9525.gif "wink"){kind=small}
I can’t imagine anyone getting upset about this. I’m always surprised when I read these threads. If you bring something nice, open it. If you bring something not nice (for the non-Geek), then who cares what they do with it.
edit Seems to me from reading this thread, that some of you are doing a slow burn. I think this is the bigger issue being discussed.
This is a fair point, and [Probably thread drift] what do you do if bringing wine to such a person?
For that group of people, for whom Charles Shaw or Little Penguin may be just fine and good QPR, what’s your bottle gift? Do you bring something at that level, and risk insulting them with plonk? Do you go a bit more (let’s say a name winery’s “vintner’s blend”)? Do you step it up and hope that the $15-20 bottle you gave them will be enjoyed and perhaps convert them? Of course, each of these come with the risk that they open it and you have to drink it, or they don’t open it but you wanted to drink it.
If the people who invited you don’t ‘know’ you are a wine geek, the chances are greater that your wine won’t be opened, so bring something like Revelation from Trader Joes - it’s like $6.00, looks fancy, and if they actually DO open it, tastes pretty dang good. Miles superior to the Shaw.
If I’m invited to someone’s house for dinner, I ask ahead of time: Hey, would you like me to bring a bottle of wine for dinner? Sets the expectation ahead of time…
To go back to my (and others’) suggestion earlier in the thread, you had two bottles, it would have covered all bases to say “We brought you one as a gift to enjoy some other time, plus we brought one that you can open with dinner tonight.” And if you feared the host might not open the second bottle anyway, you could have brought that one already opened.
Next time. Like I said lesson learned. Except I wouldn’t go back to this house for other reasons. Nor would I ever bring an open wine unless I already know the people.
My friends know me. They usually ask me to bring stuff. If it’s a dinner party, it’s easy. Weave the concept of a good wine pairing with the food they are making into the conversation and figure out what their expectations are. I have never had a problem. Many times, I bring multiple bottles and give one to the host with a special caveat that it is intended as a gift to savor later and specifically tell them that they should not open it. We’re talking friends here, right?
I’m amazed at the responses in this thread. Is everyone in the world really so sensitive that bringing a bottle of wine to open when you’ve been invited to dinner is offensive? Weird. Just plain weird. No wonder the whole civility thread was such a cluster.
I’m probably just dense, but I don’t understand what it is in this thread that you find so disturbing. Just wine lovers talking about different approaches to bringing wine to a dinner party both as gifts and to drink that night.
Same here.
As a host, unless the wine brought by a guest is particularly horrid (to me), I will open it along with my own bottles. Throughout the years, there have been barely a handful of times when guests bringing wine have asked me to keep the bottles they brought for myself; and, in those cases, I open them the next time I am with them (as much as possible).
Once, a friend (not a wino) brought a bottle of Carlo Rossi to a dinner I was hosting at home. I didn’t open it, but left it with my bottles that were breathing for dinner. Later in the evening, he asked me to open his bottle - so I did, and poured him a glass. Later still, he asked me to try his wine. I replied that I would “in a while”, but I never did. He never noticed.
Not disturbed. Amazed. Amazed that people either really are that sensitive or perceive others to be that sensitive. We’re talking about bringing a bottle of wine to someone’s house & it is being discussed in this thread as if it is a very sensitive topic that must be considered seriously to avoid offense to others. It’s wine for God’s sake. 
I always ask if I can bring all the wine for dinner.
It’s the only way to be sure.
Who is so sensitive about the subject, other than yourself?