Red or White Wine Hamper, and Which One to Send

Send the white if you know they drink white. Send the red if you are working from anything less than that. The two boxes hold the same five things to eat at the same price, so the bottle is the only variable, and the safer answer is the one that needs no fridge and no timing.

That is the short version. The longer one takes two minutes, and it gets easier the moment you stop thinking about wine and start listing what you already know about the person. The Gourmet Treats with Red Wine Hamper and the Gourmet Treats with White Wine Hamper are the two boxes in question, both at $74.95, and the run of situations below starts with the most you could know about a recipient and ends with the least.

Start from what you already know about them

Work down the list until something fits, then stop. The first line that describes your recipient is your answer.

1. You have sat at a table with them and the bottle was white. Send the Gourmet Treats with White Wine Hamper. People who drink white are usually specific about it, and a Shiraz turning up instead is a polite way of saying you were guessing.
2. You know when the box will be opened. A hot afternoon between Boxing Day and Australia Day belongs to the Sauvignon Blanc, cold. A December evening that ends in cheese and chocolate belongs to the Shiraz. Prawns, cold ocean trout or a bowl of oysters settle it the same way the heat does, in favour of the white.
3. You know where it lands. A shared office kitchen in December, a hotel room, a house with twelve people staying in it. Fridge space is the thing to check, because the red is ready the moment the ribbon comes off and the white wants two hours and a spare shelf first.
4. They drink both, and the gift is a milestone. The Ultimate Gourmet Hamper with Shiraz and White Wine carries a Château Tanunda Grand Barossa Shiraz and a Grand Barossa white with a longer food list around them, so nobody at that table has to choose. It is a step up in price rather than a swap, which is the point of it.
5. You are not certain they drink at all. Somebody pregnant, somebody driving home, somebody who stopped and made no announcement about it. The alcohol-free hampers carry the same style of food without the bottle, and a guess that lands wrong is more awkward than a box with no wine in it.
6. None of the above applies. Send the red. Not because it is the better bottle, but because the food in the box was chosen around it, and because a Shiraz asks nothing of the person receiving it except a corkscrew.

The five things that are in both boxes

The food cannot break the tie, because the food does not change. Both hampers are packed from one list, into the same French Blue box finished with gold ribbon, by the same team in Corio.

Everything around the food matches as well. The price is the same to the cent, both carry a free personalised gift card under the ribbon, and most of our hampers travel inside an insulated shipper. Price, packing and food have no vote here. The wine casts the only one.

If it helps to know which way the food leans, it leans red. Truffle, fig and cocoa are all earthy, and earthiness is what a Shiraz is built to meet. The fig pyramid is dark fruit concentrated into a slab, and the cocoa on the truffles is bitter rather than sweet, which is what lets a dry red sit beside chocolate without either turning sour. The white works from the other side. Sauvignon Blanc is the crisp, high acid end of white wine, and acidity is what cuts salt and butter, so against the sea salt crackers and the shortbread it is the better glass by some distance.

Questions we get asked about these two boxes

Is there any difference between the red and white hampers apart from the wine?

No. Same five food items, same sizes, same French Blue box, same ribbon, same price. We pack them from one list with one variable on it. If somebody at your table prefers white and somebody prefers red, you are choosing between two identical gifts with different labels on the bottle.

Which one do I send if I have no idea what they drink?

The red. Not because it is better, but because the food in the box leans earthy and savoury, and because a Shiraz needs no fridge, no timing and no planning from the person receiving it. A white that arrives warm and gets drunk warm is a worse gift than a red that arrives ready.

Do the hampers need to go in the fridge when they arrive?

Nothing in them needs refrigerating. Everything in the box is shelf stable, which is why it travels well in an Australian summer. Chill the Sauvignon Blanc for a couple of hours before serving, and the red is better a little below room temperature on a warm day.

Which one to add to the order

If you know they drink white, send the white box and say so on the card. If you are working from anything less than that, send the red, because the truffle chips, the fig pyramid and the cocoa dusted truffles were chosen for it and it needs nothing from the recipient but a corkscrew. Both are hand packed by our team on the northern edge of Geelong. Orders placed before 12pm on a weekday are dispatched the same day from our Corio, VIC warehouse, tracked with Australia Post. Both boxes sit inside our wider Christmas hampers range. Enjoy responsibly.