With friends · ski trip
Wine for a week in a ski chalet: raclette, red and cases in the boot
Twelve friends, a chalet, a week or a long weekend. Skiing by day, dinner in the evening: raclette, fondue, a leg of lamb or a daube. The tool works out the wine for the stay and each person's share. For an address in the mountains, the safest solution is often to order before you leave.
The calculation
The result changes with each answer. Nothing is sent until you click on the quote.
What the tool assumes
Only the evening is counted: an aperitif and a dinner, 0.4 bottle per person, or 2.4 glasses. Lunchtime wine on the slopes isn't in the calculation, and your knees will thank you. Twelve friends over seven nights comes to 34 bottles, rounded up to six cases: 18 red, 12 white, 6 champagne. For a long weekend of four nights, four cases.
- White with the raclette, red the other nights. Melted cheese likes a crisp dry white; a tannic red makes it heavy. The what wine with raclette page explains why. Red comes back with the charcuterie, served cool, and with the lamb, the daube or the fondue bourguignonne: a Bordeaux Supérieur or a cru bourgeois five to eight years old.
- Order before you leave. Have it delivered to your home the week before and take the cases up in the boot: six cases fit in an estate car. It's the only solution whose timing depends neither on the snow nor on the resort car park.
- Delivery to the chalet, if access allows. A car-free resort, a road that needs snow chains, a chalet with no lorry access, nobody to receive it before Saturday: the lead time and access are to be confirmed on the quote, like the price. The delivery page gives the orders of magnitude for the lowlands.
Wine travels well in the cold, but not in a freeze: a boot left overnight at −15 °C can push corks out. Bring the cases in when you arrive. For a mountain house you own, see wine for a holiday home; for a villa in summer, the wine for a rental with friends.
How many bottles for a week's skiing for twelve?
Around thirty: an aperitif and a dinner each night, 0.4 bottle per person, 34 bottles over seven nights, rounded up to six cases of six. At the everyday level, champagne included, €402, or €34 per person. For a long weekend of four nights, four cases and €17 each.
What wine for a week of raclettes and fondues?
A dry white for the melted cheese, a supple red for the charcuterie and the meat dishes. Out of six cases, a mostly cheese week gives 18 white and 12 red; a mostly meat week, 24 red and 6 white. Over a week, the champagne keeps one case for the last night.
Can you have it delivered to the chalet?
Sometimes. It all depends on access: a car-free resort or a snowy road can't be delivered to like a lowland village, and someone needs to be there to receive it. The lead time, access and price are to be confirmed on the quote; give the exact address and the arrival date. The safest option is still to have it delivered to your home before you leave.
Who drives home?
The calculation counts all the friends who drink; whoever drives down the valley on Saturday morning comes out of the count the night before. The wine and drivers page says how to plan without lecturing anyone.