The Inveterate Wine Glugger

Are you one of those people? No sooner has anyone put an opened bottle of wine and a glass in front of you and off you go, knocking back the stuff as if it's going out of fashion, as if someone will appear at any moment to take the wine away? Are you an inveterate wine glugger?

I'm not trying to make you feel bad about being a glugger - there are even times when it is not only acceptable but de rigueur - but I do need to point out that this is not what you should be doing all the time and with any wine put in front of you. And no, it is not about being pretentious or precious, about only drinking the best wines on the planet at stratospheric cost or saying idiotic things like 'I only drink Chateau XXX 198X with my meals'. I don't fraternise with people who think or behave like that, because I love wine and its capacity to enhance our lives (and I think they're idiots!); this is not necessarily dependent on fashion or price tag!

Glugging should be part and parcel of a convivial meal with friends and revolve around tasting and eating food with wine as companion, both being the background melody to friendship, conversation, bonding.
Please understand that wine is meant to be sipped, nosed and appreciated for all it brings to our live over and above the alcoholic hit, which is only minor compared to spirits anyway. Have a look at a previous post 'Lunch is a Battlefield' to see what I mean - yep, we glugged well that afternoon, spending wonderful, convivial time with like-minded individuals, friends.

We are sometimes tempted to glug away in private, and sometimes do; this should be avoided if at all possible and certainly never be a regular occurrence, as it is a one-way road to unpleasant oblivion - it can become wine (or alcohol, if you prefer) abuse, a prelude to your (painful) demise.

So respect wine, please, treat it with affection not condescension and only glug it with food and company, otherwise sip, sip, sip. Select it with care - the bottle shown is a straightforward, relatively simple Spanish red of exceptional value on promotion with a bit of  much-needed age (2010 vintage, so good I've shown it twice!) - and drink with respect. The wine deserves your respect, so choose a nice glass (look at the one I chose, perfect, huh?) and a good corkscrew.

There, job done, sip away and pity the inveterate glugger.