For the last ten years, the final Saturday in February has become an important night for wine lovers around the world. Each year, this particular Saturday provides the excuse to open that special bottle of wine that you’ve got tucked away for that special occasion that never seems to arrive.
Open That Bottle Night was invented by Dorothy J. Gaiter and John Brecher, the husband-and-wife team that writes the wine column for the Wall Street Journal. Here’s how they described their invention of this night in their memoir, Love by the Glass, after writing a column about how people should age their wines:
The response to “aging your wines” column was surprising. We received dozens of heartfelt letters from people who had one special bottle of wine. They all wanted to know whether their particular bottle of wine was still good and, if so, when it would be ready to drink. (The usually added, shyly, “How much is it worth?”) We answered all these letters the same way. Your bottle is priceless. It’s impossible to know if it’s still good until you open it. Stop waiting for a special occasion to open it and make the wine itself the special occasion. Make a special meal and celebrate the wine itself.
After we’d written this letter dozens of times, it struck us that if so many people wrote to us about this issue, it must be a widespread question. Instead of telling everybody individually about celebrating their bottle, why not just write a column with that advice for everybody…. We decided we’d set a date when we could all make a special dinner and open our bottles together. Saturday seemed like a good bet because people could spend the day preparing….Because we wanted people to open that bottle they’d kept forever, we decided to call it, simply, Open That Bottle Night.
The next week [after the column had run] was one of the most extraordinary of our lives. Remember that scene in Miracle on 34th Street, in the courtroom, when the mailmen come in with sacks and sacks of mail addressed to Santa Claus? Well, that’s what it was like. Kids from the mailroom kept arriving at our desks with stacks of mail. The tops of our desks were filled with envelopes. We took them all home and read. After the girls were in bed, we opened them and read them to each other. Each one was moving, or funnier, than the last. People from all over the world were sharing what was in their hearts with us, all because of wine. Most of the letters were long. Many were handwritten. Quite a few included menus and recipes and labels from the bottles. We responded to every one. John sat at the computer and composed letters. Dottie addressed the envelopes until her hand hurt so badly she had to stop. For almost two weeks we stayed up until two A.M. every night answering letters…. By the time the flood ended we had more than a thousand letters…. The Wall Street Journal nominated the column for a Pulitzer…. The ripples from “Open That Bottle Night” seemed to last forever.
They say good ideas only come around once in a blue moon. Ideas that can fundamentally change people’s relationships to wine come around even less frequently. Open That Bottle Night is one of those ideas. In its own small way, it achieves what wine writers toil over every day — removing the barriers to enjoying wine.
Every wine writer in existence has probably been asked about that “special” bottle that someone has, and the answer that Dorothy and John came up with is precisely the right one. Wine should be enjoyed with the people we love, whether it is a $10 bottle or a dusty treasure that we’ve been hoarding for the “right time” that never quite seems to arrive.
So if you can, grab one of those bottles you’ve been saving for a while. You know, the ones you always pass over in the rack because they’re a little too good to bring to that party, or a little to expensive to open with pizza, or a little too close to that perfect memory of your Tuscan vacation. Pop that sucker open with people that mean a lot to you and celebrate the fact that wine makes the world better.
I’m using the occasion to help a friend inaugurate his new restaurant in San Francisco, and Ruth, Sparrow, and I, along with our friends Jack and Joanne and their son Trent, will be opening a few bottles that have been crying out for drinking, including a late 90’s vintage Champagne, an old bottle of California Pinot, a strange bottle of southern Italian white wine made by a crank winemaker, and if we’re in the mood, an old Riesling as well.
If you’re reading this entry on Sunday, or even Monday, don’t worry. The event works just as well on any day of the week. Grab that bottle and something good to eat, and enjoy yourself.
