If the dinner was a quiet rebellion against the hurried life, it was a story told in slow, deliberate sips.

Because some wines demand attention. Some meals refuse to be rushed. The inaugural installment of this year’s Wine Dinner Series in Tagaytay last Saturday ensured we give in to both.

The quarterly banquet celebrates the finest wines from around the world — in Anya Resort’s most extensive cellar.

Here, Anya’s Samira by Chele made a case for why wine should be an event and no mere accompaniment.

I was noshing on some tacos when the sommelier popped the cork with bottles from Ribera del Duero, Spain’s hallowed ground of Tempranillo-driven reds that brooded with cult fruits and spice.

“Franck Massard Cava Brut,” he bellowed with quiet reverence, the way you might introduce an old friend. “Catalonia’s answer to champagne, but with none of the pretense and all of the soul.”

I have never really understood all the finer details of the wine’s terroir. All I knew was that, while some wines are poured, ours arrived with the weight of history and the certainty of knowing they belong to our table.

I swirled my glass of Arzuaga Rosae without being overly specific about the nose and the palate, but rather a careful reverence to a fading memory: Warm, lingering, slipping through the fingers before I was ready to let go.

A few paces later, the sommelier unleashed a sleeping giant to temper the weather, a semi-vintage Cruz de Alva Fuentelum.

He let it breathe.

I imagine the makers, glass in hand and lost in awe. Even gods, given enough wine, must lose themselves in their own creations.

It was savory, meaty and lush on the palate, with polished tannins and a smooth finish.

The flow was infinite, the sip a conversation, a masterclass in knowing exactly what to say, and when to let spill an imposing libation.

“Fancy another glass?”

If anything, it made me slow down and think about the richness and depth that we sometimes fail to see because we eat too quickly, swallow too mindlessly, and forget too soon.