How much can you drink at a time? The answer is purely individual, because the question of the amount of alcohol consumed has two polar points of view. The owners of wine shops are sure that any alcohol from 5 to 45 percent of the fortress can be consumed virtually every day, but doctors have the opposite point of view and agree to give a small correction for natural grape wines. From the position of etiquette, the borderline question "how much?" Looks like this: if a person does not have health problems and he knows how to handle high-quality alcoholic beverages, then you can drink as much as you like, and you want to savor beverages like a delicious culinary dish. Getting drunk to lose an adequate state is ridiculous, how to overeat to bulimia - this is the rule of well-bred people, only a dose in grams each has its own.
About 15 years ago it was believed that alcoholic beverages should be consumed only on holidays. This was explained very simply: because nothing decent was proposed except for Russian vodka, and the consequences of using vodka in significant quantities do not contribute to success in work, then the culture of alcohol consumption as such was not studied in principle. The edge of our ear, our people have heard that in many southern European countries - the family does not sit down to dinner at the table, if it does not have a bottle of table wine. How to choose the right wine, what kind of wine and how to distinguish them from the "bad."
The first toast says a toastmaker. This role belongs to a certain person at any table. Usually this is the master of the house, but he can redirect the right to say a toast to any of the guests.
Ladies do not pronounce toasts! Remember this rule, embossed in the laws of etiquette in large letters.
Toasts are not pronounced with liqueurs, but with other dessert drinks (cognac, sweet wine) - it is quite possible.
Cognac, champagne, sweet and semisweet red, and sweet white and dessert wines are never served to main dishes, because they have only a dessert function.
During the meal it is necessary to serve dry wine of red and white varieties, dry sherry, or - for men - vodka, whiskey, tequila, rum, gin. Alcoholic beverages such as sherry, vodka, Madeira and port must be poured into a decanter.
Before serving red wine on the table, it should be slightly cooled to 16-18 degrees.
Cognac can not be drunk cold, it will spontaneously heat up in a glass when it is savored, or it should be heated on a special stand with a candle.
Sparkling wine or champagne is usually served in a bucket of ice and water, or before serving, cool in the freezer, but do not freeze.
White dry wine is served cooled to 12-14 degrees.
When you start to pour wine, be sure to wipe the neck with a napkin so that the drops of wine do not fall on the tablecloth, you have to turn the bottle around its axis, and only then raise the bottle from the glass.
Spilling liquor in glasses, remember that to the edge of the glass should remain at least two centimeters, and it is better to pour only half a glass.
When pouring wine into glasses, they can not be kept on weight. The glass should stand on the table!
For you, a toast is spoken, you do not start drinking immediately, otherwise it will turn out that you are drinking for your health and well-being. First, guests should be attached to the glass, and only then you.
To refuse to toast in honor of a person means disrespect. It is necessary to take a glass and drink water or juice. Water in general is the best drink in the opening of the reception while the guests did not greet the hosts and did not find common acquaintances. Do not drink immediately - it's very fashionable. Toast with water was not considered a toast in the old days. However, the Swedish King Karl Gustav introduced the rule to raise glasses with mineral water. Since the royal etiquette is a priority over the secular, the rule of raising a toast with water is an excellent way for those who can not or do not want to drink.
Explain why you raise a glass not with alcohol, but with water or juice, absolutely not required. No one has the right to ask you a supposedly ridiculous question: "are you sick," "pregnant?", "Encoded?" And so on. These are bad jokes of ill-bred people.
Suppose you were invited to a dinner party. By a strange tradition, a couple of bottles of semisweet champagne appear on the table. Then the ladies turn to wine, and men - the tip, whiskey, tequila, etc. During lunch, loud disputes, conflicts, other stupid situations suddenly begin, for which normal people feel ashamed. The reason for inadequate behavior in such cases is dessert semisweet champagne served to guests on an empty stomach and causing the most violent and rapid intoxication. This is a colossal error that hosts and guests allow, because the function of semisweet champagne, like cognac, is a sip with a cake at the end of the reception.
How to distinguish good, right wines from "bad"? Strengthened wines such as sherry, Madeira, port, we will not consider. Wine ripens and becomes qualitative only when all the sugar contained in the grapes, thanks to the added wine-making enzymes, will finally turn into alcohol. Such wine without sugar will not bring the slightest harm to a person's health and you can literally drink it with bottles. The fortress of wine is a universal figure for all European wines. The most dry wine, has a fortress of 13-14% and is called brut. If on the bottle of wine the inscription is 15-17% - here the fortified wine, in which the cognac spirit is additionally added, and this wine is no longer natural. After the Bruce, the degree of wine decreases like this:
dry wine - 12-12.5%,
Semi-dry - 11-11.5%,
semi-sweet - 10-10.5%,
and sweet - below 10%.
At diplomatic receptions only dry wines are served, and even semi-dry ones are already questionable. From dry wines, because they do not have sugar, do not get fat, do not blush, do not get drunk and never get sick in the mornings, and therefore etiquette recognizes this category of alcoholic beverages as good wines.