Every year Domaine de la Romanée-Conti’s UK importers Corney and Barrow host a tasting of the latest vintage to be released, held at their offices an inevitably windy walk east of the Tower of London. These are extremely rare wines, and it is such a treat to taste them – especially now that their prices have soared, thanks to dramatically increased global demand – that even tasters who are rarely seen in public turn up.
Don’t ask me how you get an allocation. Nor do I know how prices are set in order to minimise the likelihood that the lucky...