Is it acceptable for a waiter to turn my expensive red into a blend?

Q: At an upmarket restaurant, my partner and I ordered a three-figure bottle of red. After filling our glasses, the waiter whisked the bottle away, then returned to refill our glasses with the wrong bottle. Upon realising his mistake, he retrieved the correct bottle, then topped up our glasses, saying, “Now you have a red-wine blend.”

Is this acceptable?P.H.

, Mount Waverley, Vic A: You’re asking the wrong guy: I know nothing about wine. My wine cellar is just the dusty spot on top of the fridge where all the cooking grease collects, and my collection is a few under-$14, end of-bin, no-label wines and one special-occasion $15 bottle that says “Produce of Guatemala” and came with a free cooler bag. So a three-figure bottle of wine is beyond my imaginary capabilities; it would have to taste like peaches, coffee, frangipani, peanut M&Ms, the soup dumplings at HuTong’s, and Lisa Sullivan’s caramel-crème chapstick during my first pash in a game of kiss chasey behind the shelter shed at Rainbow Street Primary.

And no, I don’t know exactly how much you paid: a three-figure bottle could’ve cost you $100 or it could’ve cost you $999. Either way, it’s more than my taxable income between the ages of 27 to 31. So any wine that pricey should be served intact and untainted – on a velvet cushion, carried by Margot Robbie sitting on the shoulders of Idris Elba.

But even I know that mixing the two wines was unacceptable. You should’ve asked for a refund or a brand-new bottle – and if the waiter refused, you should’ve tipped him at the end of the night by reaching into your pocket and handing over a 20-cent piece, a Butter-Menthol wrapper and some pocket lint, then saying, “There. Now you have a waiter’s tip blend.”

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