Nah. Alfert is totally laissez faire. They have to figure it out, survive, be productive. If I have to set basic benchmarks, they fail. 
Fu would last a week under Alfert, and probably only king enough to tap the office fridge.
Many years ago I was dating a woman while I was going through college that did this with my last bottle of 2004 Didier Dagueneau Buisson Renard on Christmas Eve. I came home from work to find my last bottle of Dagueneau on the kitchen countertop. I think her response was something like, “I opened this because I thought the label was cute. This is really good, why do you only have one bottle? You should buy more.”
You bet your sweet ass it was! Yum.
My S.O. had a bottom-less “drink now” box which recently got wet and collapsed. Now she slums it by choosing from the designated “drink now” rack. There’s never a bottle on it that I wouldn’t willingly drink myself. She doesn’t touch the other goodies. I’d give her a free hand, but wouldn’t want it to become a habit!
Wine Fridge at work?..yeah, that’s fair game, unless there’s a padlock.
RT
+1, although my wine is better than his. Alf and I might have an agreement on 2010 Paolo Scavino Bricco Ambrogio, of which I do have one bottle in my office. I also have a bottle of Millet whiskey, a bottle of GOT beer, and a bottle of Amaretto that I use for making Sangria, if you prefer those. Unfortunately, the Balvenie 18 is long gone.
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I told her the estimated replacement cost. She almost died. She was like a $15 bottle sort of person.
My wife is WSET level 3 and sells wine for a living, so she gets to pull whatever the hell she wants. 
#blessed
So any time after lunch?
On the flipside, I could definitely get in trouble opening the wrong scotch. Some of our best bottles are ostensibly “mine” because he justified the expense by calling them presents for me. I am not sure he’d appreciate it if I opened some of “my” bottles without him, though. 
Not yet, but I suspect the day will come when my kids get busted for doing this. They will do chores if not employed, or will use their wages to buy replacements if/when this happens; the goal is for them to think twice before doing that again. Restitution will only be part of the punishment — after all, that would be theft, just like a couple of the stories here.
Do you guys know that it is possible to get locks for your wine cellars? We have a lock and only my wife and I have a key.
I often have a case or two at my office until I find a place to put it at home. Sometimes they stay there quite a bit longer than expected. My staff are good about keeping “juice” deliveries safely in a credenza for me and away from eyes.
A friend runs an engineering firm in Toronto, his boardroom has 4 completely packed 500 bottle cellars along the walls, which are his overflow/delivery cellar. He did have the modesty to cover the inside of the glass doors with rolls of paper sheeting so clients or staff can’t see inside. He jokes that as part of his buy/sell with the younger associate that will take over, is that when he leaves and sells the company to her, he gets to keep his extra cellars on-site.
No worries about my cellar being raided. My wife mostly abstains and my boys don’t like wine at this point. I lock things up if we’re away more than the evening.
Our bar cart however…well, I’ll be taking photos of bottles anytime my kids have friends over and we’re not going to be home.
Somewhat only tangentially related, but I was house sitting for a friend and she said “help yourself to anything in the fridge”… so I open the fridge and find this bottle of ‘66 Leroy Chapelle-Chambertin, sitting next to a bottle of Justin Cabernet and a crumpled foil packet of korean BBQ she had brought home from a picnic. ![[wow.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/7/7d450e9830889c8943b674446a21b7254cad657e.gif "wow"){kind=small}
till you realize the kids added water to the bottles they drank out of.
So much this.
We are both into wine but I’m slightly more neurotic. My wife can drink anything she wants, at any time, but enlists my help to organise the cellar based on those that are daily drinkers vs those that are more special or require more time. It’s worked well for both of us.
That sounds like the type of friend I’d hang out with more!
That would take all the fun out of luring your partners to your irresistible stash and waiting/prodding for guilty confessions.
RT
Same here. My wife wouldn’t even think of opening wine when I am not there, and certainly not because of any reaction I might have. The wines are ours; she can drink whatever she likes. But if I am not around, there is just no chance she is going to open something. Just wouldn’t think of it.
I used to have a case or two of wines that my wife could open whenever she wanted. Look, everything in the cellar is hers as much as it is mine. She can drink whatever she wants from the cellar. But, she does not know for a good number of the wines in my cellar what is an everyday drinker, what is special, what should be drunk now, what should be held. This gave her the ability to open something if I was still at work or away on a work trip, etc., without touching something where IF SHE KNEW MORE she would have not wanted to open it. Now that we have retired this does not come up as much and she likely would just consult with me before opening anything. But, frankly, if we are having people for dinner or something and she wants to open a certain bottle, we generally open it. Not a big issue.
And, she does have a key to the wine cellar.
Have her call my wife. Rebecca will teach her how it is done. I have no problem with Rebecca opening anything she wants in my cellar except for the Nacionals and the old Madeira that is hard to replace, and she she hates those, it’s not an issue.
This is my house method as well.
Shelf 1 = Open anytime you like
Shelf 2 = Open if you’re feeling a bit fancy
The rest = Don’t touch