On What All of This Is Actually For

I have spent a good deal of ink instructing you on temperature, glassware, spoons, and the correct hour for cheese. I should like to say plainly, once, what all of it is in service of, and then I shall resume being insufferable.

None of it is about being right. I have watched people use this sort of knowledge as a fence, deployed to establish who belongs at the table and who is merely visiting, and it is the least interesting use anyone has ever found for a bottle of wine.

The knowledge exists for one reason: it increases the amount of pleasure available to you. A wine at the right temperature simply gives you more. A cheese properly warmed says more. That is the whole return, and it is a considerable one.

The ultimate luxury is not access to expensive things. It is living life on your own terms, in the company you choose, paying attention to something on purpose. The caviar is incidental. Pleasant, but incidental.

So learn the rules, apply the ones that serve you, and discard any that turn a good evening into an examination. Then invite someone over.

I shall now return to complaining about ice.