The Vintage Caper (Sam Levitt Capers Book 1)

It was not unknown, he said, for a Châteauneuf to reach fifteen percent of alcoholic content. And these days, when Bordeaux seems to get thinner every year and the price of Burgundy is only possible for the Japanese, the wines of Châteauneuf are nothing less than bargains.

Lynch-Bages, Lafite Rothschild, Phelan Segur, Latour, Pontet-Canet, Beychevelle, Cos d’Estournel—if there were to be a wine list in heaven, selected by the Great Sommelier in the sky, these names would belong in it.

Wine and conversation flowed, the courses came and went, and I was treated to a demonstration of the French genius for the gastronomic marathon, the ability to spend as long at the table as other nationalities spend watching television. The size of French appetites never fails to impress me, nor does the Frenchman’s ability to absorb vast amounts o

He tucked his napkin under his chin and murmured to the waiter. “Un grand?” said the waiter. “Un grand,” said Régis, and sixty seconds later a large glass pitcher, opaque with cold, was placed in front of us. Régis became professorial; our lesson was about to commence. “In a serious restaurant,” he said, “one can always have confidence in the house