£18,000 Pétrus is a fake, says customer

It was the moment those in the Michelin-starred London restaurant had been anticipating for weeks.

	The restaurant Zafferano in Knightsbridge, called in the "Pétrus police", from Corney & Barrow

Staff were delighted at the sale and the three customers were eager to taste the £18,000 magnum of Pétrus 1961 - one of the greatest vintages of one of the greatest wines in the world - which they had reserved from the cellars several weeks before.

Unfortunately, the guests at Zafferano in Knightsbridge proved to be a little too discerning.

As the magnum was uncorked, they declared it to be a fake, refused to touch the bottle and sent it back.

Worse was to follow. When Enzo Cassini, the general manager who had come in on his day off to serve the Pétrus personally, took a sip he declared it undrinkable.

"It tasted of vegetable, a bit mouldy. It was definitely not good," he said yesterday. "The 1961 is absolutely a great wine but this one was bad luck."

The customer refused to accept the Pétrus after he spotted that the cork did not carry the authenticating stamps.

Mr Cassini will only identify the customer as "a young, smart Englishman, not City" who had been coming to Zafferano for 14 years.

"Yes, the customer was cross. He's an expert and he said 'This could be a fake'," said Mr Cassini. The restaurant called in the "Pétrus police", from Corney & Barrow, a wine bar chain who are agents for the producer in Britain.

However, their investigations into the authenticity of the magnum proved inconclusive. In a statement they said: "It is impossible to confirm 100 per cent the authenticity of a wine pre-1964."

Before that date, Pétrus was family-run with limited record keeping and erratic cork stamps.

Mr Cassini said yesterday: "I am sure the bottle was genuine, but the wine? I just don't know."

However, the customer's anger was assuaged. He went on to order Zafferano's most expensive bottle, a magnum of Mouton Rothschild 1945 for £20,000, instead.