A chilling experience

And so to our main courses: duck, chicken, sea bass. We left it to the fish-eater to decide whether she wanted a rich white or a light and juicy red, and she opted for the latter. So find us the right bottle, Steve.

He's good-humoured and casual, rare qualities among this often coffin-stiff calling. There is almost no wine more useful on a restaurant list than a pungent, fresh, vivid and vibrant light red wine - yet this gets harder to find with each year, as all those who produce reds attempt to freight them down with extra blackness, tannin and thick-cut fruit. Red burgundy should be an option, but when you need £50 or more to have any real choice it becomes a theoretical one only. We ended up with a toss-up between a red Loire or a Beaujolais.

The New World in general doesn't have much to bring to this particular banquet, but we should, perhaps, have considered the Pinot Noir from St Clair in New Zealand's Marlborough. Steve was on the right track, though, in suggesting we drink our light red chilled (it was a close and steamy night).

The 1999 St Nicolas de Bourgueil from Domaine du Fondis emerged as the anointed bottle (£41.06 including service), but it was, alas, thin and charmless, the sort of wine which makes France enemies it can ill afford. The chilling, deeper than usual, served only to accentuate its weaknesses, just as a spell in a morgue does little to heighten beauty. We liked Steve so much that we all felt sorry for him and pretended (at least until he asked) that we quite liked it really. But we didn't.

There are some good bottles on this list, compiled by the much-admired Joelle Marti - C?te R?tie from Rostaing and Cuilleron, white Bergerac from Tour des Gendres, Mataro from Ridge - but you need that spare £50 note. Cheaper bottles don't shine as brightly and restaurants of this calibre can't really afford to list duds like our Bourgueil.

Wine list scores 2 out of 5.