Yesterday afternoon I was making a saucepan of spaghetti bol so that we'd have a quick-to-prepare meal ready for when we all got home late from Touch Training (Marc + Cait with the other two in tow) and a BUG meeting (me).

I like to put red wine in my spag bol - it gives it this certain je ne sais quoi. [In other words I think it tastes better...] I gave up on cask reds for cooking a long time ago because I actually don't cook that many meals that require red wine. I figure you may as well use something that you can actually drink, and I like to think that the food tastes better with good wine in it!!

My motto is "I like to cook with wine. Sometimes I even put it in the food." So.. my usual M.O. is to have a bottle of red hanging around - I'll slosh some in the bolognaise, and then have a glass over dinner (except that lately I've been avoiding the reds because I tend to wake up the next day with a headache.)

I glance around the kitchen and find no opened bottles on the go, so I go to the bottom of the bookshelf where we've been keeping the reds. Only one left. Oooh, a cork instead of screw top. This isn't Marc's good wine is it? Nah.. wasn't that 'living' over on the buffet hutch underneath all the other 'stuff'...

Fast forward to 7.45 pm, and Marc is putting the spaghetti on to cook. I hear a gasp from the kitchen:

"You... opened... the....good... red.... ...."

"... the one you gave me for my 40th. (3 years ago.)

"The one I was saving for a special occasion."

Oh. Shit.

"You don't put this quality wine in cooking!"

(OMG, and it's the only wine we've ever 'cellared' as such too.)

In the range of stupid things I've done, this rates reasonably highly, especially since I gave it to him in the first place.

I suppose we all make mistakes.

So there we sat, slurping my old faithful spag bol, each with a glass of 6 year old, upmarket Penfolds Bin 389.

Bloody nice it was too.

And I didn't wake up with a headache either... I suppose that makes it pretty special....

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