As a non-Champagne drinker I've ignored year after year of seeing lengthy threads on the fizz pass me by, just wondering whether one day someone might actually start a thread on red wine, which is just about all I drink (apart from espresso coffee and tap water). Today's "Another Champagne Thread" was the last straw; I thought to appeal to others who like their tannins and might want to chat about it.

As a starter, the sheer repetitiveness of the wine lack-of-choices over a prolonged period of time annoys me: KLM (one my alternate carriers) changes its selection monthly or thereabupts, and themes wines with food - recently for example central european food was paired with swiss and austrian wines. My unclear recollection of the last 5 years of travelling in BA long-haul club class is that I've been drinking one type of Rioja for the last 12 months with rare interludes of an Italian, preceded by Gigondas on every flight for the previous 3 years, preceded by Rioja for the prior period. Somehow this has never seemed an adequate choice. At home I vary my wine choice each bottle. Surely BA could vary it monthly, or at least quarterly? Or do they seriously buy it in such massive bulk- by the road-tanker - that they can only change the wine on an annual basis? Really sad if that's the case. I switched from always asking for the Rioja, to always asking for the Gigondas, back to always asking for the Rioja, in half-a-decade. In First there's a Bordeaux I quite like, its not bad (it has a gold label but I can't recall the name as its a few months since I was up front and I'm not generally a Bordeaux fan) but it's been on every one of the last 10 flights in F so far as I can recall. One time I met some cabin crew in Lagos and when I boarded by flight some time later there was a glass of the usual Rioja (which is actually quite good, just I rather not have it every single flight) already sitting beside my 64A seat. Somehow I also have the impression - not confirmed - that the wine choice is destination (or menu?) specific. After 12 months flying African routes non stop, fuelled only by Gigondas, I did Houston twice in succession and there was a rather good Chateau-neuf-de-Pape, whose chief merit to my taste buds was perhaps that it was not Gigondas.

I like red wine, and actually on an individual basis the 3 wines BA have served me over the last decade have been each rather good. But I am bored to tears with the same stuff appearing every single time, for literally years on end, on the routes I fly. Cannot something more varied be introduced? KLM have shown me that it is logistically possible...