My grandparents’ home was a proper house, on the cusp of the Hampstead Heath Extension, with roses and flagstones at the front. It was the sort that looked like it housed a robust wine collection – solid on account of good, aged European bottles, bought at a time when standards were, one assumes, higher. 

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There was one bottle in my grandfather’s possession that came with particular fanfare: a 1974 Bordeaux whose label was so far gone you couldn’t see exactly what it was. As a treat, I arranged to have the sommelier of the Connaught Hotel examine and open it. Once the cork gave way, a thud of brown sediment rocked the bottle. It was decanted and it breathed – inasmuch as a long-dead thing can breathe. Still hopeful, we tried the sherry-looking stuff – and it was nasty.

Clearly old and French had been mistaken for good – by both myself and my grandpa. But if you do want to be sure you aren’t sitting on a lucky gem these days, it’s wise to get Claude involved. 

These days, I am not the only one turning to Daddy AI for wine advice. The New York Times recently ran a piece on the customers consulting chatbots in........

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