Birthday · 40th
Wine for a 40th birthday: the party, and 1986, the easy great year
Forty is the lucky decade. The party looks like a small wedding: fifty guests, an aperitif, a seated dinner, a party that goes on until two in the morning. And the birth year is 1986, a great Bordeaux vintage, still findable at reasonable prices. For once, the bottle of the year is not a gamble.
The wine for the party
Set for 50 guests: an hour-and-a-half aperitif, a seated dinner, two hours of evening party, 80% drinkers. A party with lots of children drops to 70%.
What the party gets through
Aperitif
An hour and a half of sparkling, white and rosé: two and a half glasses per drinker, about twenty bottles for 40 drinkers.
Dinner
Three glasses per person, a white then two reds. About twenty bottles, and this is where the wine that matters goes.
Evening party
Two hours of sparkling and rosé after dessert. About ten bottles. At 40, people still dance, but they go home for the babysitter.
The raw count is 47 bottles; the calculator shows about sixty after the 10% margin and rounding up to cases per colour. A little over one bottle per guest over the day.
The 1986 bottle
A great vintage, tannic, still standing
1986 is the Cabernet year: a large harvest, a dry, hot September, dense and tannic Médoc wines that took twenty-five years to relax. At forty, the classified growths of Pauillac, Saint-Julien and Saint-Estèphe are in their window, with substance still and mellowed tannins. The Right Bank did less well; it is a Left Bank vintage.
The price is reasonable for a great forty-year-old vintage: €80–200 for a classified growth, more for the top names. Plenty of it is still around, with good provenance. The 1986 Sauternes is also excellent and costs less.
Open it at dinner, with the main course, at the table of those closest: it is a wine with presence that goes with red meat. Stood upright two days before, opened an hour before, no long decanting. The birth-year vintage page compares 1986 with the neighbouring years.
1986 bottles in stock
The Transvins price list sorted by year: 1986 bottles first, the neighbouring years when 1986 has few. Tick what you are serving: the list keeps only the wines that go with it. For another year, the birth-year vintage page covers 1945 to 2010.
The years around 1986, in one table
| Year | The year | Wines in stock | Price incl. VAT |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1976 | Average year | Château Sigalas Rabaud, Château Rieussec | €120 |
| 1982 | Great year | Château Yquem | €468 |
| 1983 | Great year | Château Mouton Rothschild | €528 |
| 1985 | Great year | Château Margaux | €600 |
| 1986 | Great year | Château Margaux, Château Cheval Blanc, Château Yquem, Château Leoville Las Cases | €420 – €720 |
| 1988 | Great year | Château Montrose, Château Latour, Château Margaux, Château Mouton Rothschild +2 | €96 – €1,200 |
| 1989 | Great year | Château Suduirault Creme de Tete | €264 |
| 1990 | Great year | Deutz Cuvee Whiliam Deutz Coffret Bois, Veuve Cliquot La Grande Dame | €240 |
| 2008 | Good year | Château Domaine de Chevalier, Blanc Pouilly Fume Dagueneau | €60 – €78 |
| 2009 | Great year | Deutz Amour De Deutz | €300 |
| 2012 | Average year | Château Domaine de Chevalier | €78 |
| 2013 | Weak year | Dom Perignon Coffret, Château Caillou Blanc de Talbot, Château Latour Martillac | €28 – €234 |
How many bottles for a birthday party for 50 people?
About fifty raw with aperitif, dinner and evening party, about sixty rounded up to cases: roughly 18 red, 18 white, 12 rosé and 18 sparkling. Without a dance, take off a dozen. The calculator does the count for your schedule.
What wine budget to celebrate a 40th?
€700–1,100 for 50 guests in decent-to-good Bordeaux, champagne for the aperitif included. The 1986 bottle is on top: €80–200 for a Médoc classified growth in good condition. The calculator's table gives the three levels for your quantities.
Is a 1986 wine still drinkable?
Yes, and well, on the Left Bank: it is one of the vintages where the bottle of the year is a real pleasure and not just a gesture. Choose a classified-growth Médoc or a good cru bourgeois, check the fill level and provenance, and serve it at the table.
And if you'd rather give it than serve it?
A single 1986 bottle, in its case, is a gift that will keep another ten years. A magnum, rarer, ages more slowly still. The what wine to give page sorts ideas by budget; and in ten years, the 50th page explains why 1976 will be less easy.
Forty-something mistakes
- Buying everything at the same level. The dinner red gets tasted; the evening sparkling is drunk standing up. One notch up for the first, one notch down for the second.
- Leaving the 1986 until late. There is some left, but it has to be tracked down and left to rest. Two months before, not two days.
- Planning a wedding-length party. Two hours, not four. Unopened cases are not taken back.
A different number of guests or schedule? The general calculator does the same count with no presets. Do the numbers work? Ask for a quote, and say in the message if you are looking for a 1986.