All-Purpose Wine Thread - anyone interested?

Slappy is on to a good point. Unlike a lot of things in life, you can get a fine bottle of wine at a budget price.

But you do have to know what you're doing.

And, especially with whites, it pays to study a little on the best temperatures for serving.

At most restaurants, my wife and I are accustomed to having whites brought to the table ice cold. Which, generally, is wrong.

The other night, at a favorite place, they brought us the bottle of white we'd ordered – a Piesporter, a kind of dry Riesling – at just about the perfect temp. Cool, not cold. It had started to open up nicely for us.

I used to think all that stuff about "nose" was b.s., but the wife and I took a little wine class in 2001 – it met on the evening of Sept. 11, because we weren't going to let the terrorists win! – and it's made all the difference.

 

Here's two... if you can find them at Costco it's cheap; f not it's still going to be inexpensive.

Marques de Caceres, dry white Rioja... like 5.99 a bottle; they make a red, Crianza for about 8.99
Penfold's Koonunga Hill Shiraz Cabernet, like 8.99 a bottle.

Also Whole Foods and World MArket have very good, cheap wines.
HRM Rex Goliath California Pinot Grigio 2006, and Carignan Very Old Wins (red) are good too.

Lot of trial and error (run away from Panarnoz Jumilla), but you can find good stuff

 

I've slowly developed a taste for red wine, but most whites still taste like vinegar to me.

Just about the only time I drink wine is when I'm visiting my parents, who must have more than 300 bottles -- mostly expensive reds.

 

The Willm Bros. white wines from Alsace are very good at not too expensive ($10.99 a bottle here in Mass. where it's more expensive by about a buck than most places). Pinot Blanc, Reisling, Pinot Gris, Gewurztraminer, all very good for your summer fish cookery.

 

If you'd like a good inexpensive everyday red, see if your local wine stores carries Quartana Montepulciano dAbruzzo by Spinelli. It's regularly rated as one of the best buy under $10.00 and like a lof ot Italian reds, represents far better value than a lot of domestic (North American) reds.

 

That shit gives white zin a good name. :-X

 

We're in a few wine clubs at local wineries. I'm not sure how much I'm learning about wine, except that there's nothing like a Sunday afternoon going wine tasting.

Hejira Henry talked about temperature. One thing to keep in mind is that although reds are supposed to be served at room temperature, the temperature of the room is supposed to be in the high 60s, not 80 degrees.

We have BevMo which is a good place to buy wines, especially when they're having a 5-cent sale.

 

There was a wine thread a while back that had some good suggestions. If you do a search it will come up. I don't know how to link it here, otherwise I would.

 

The amount of that stuff I drank in college was off the charts. Brings back mostly fond memories, but it was foul tasting.

 

i'm a red guy to the point that i don't care if i'm making some great food-match faux pas by drinking red when it's supposed to be white.

while some items at whole foods are on the expensive side, it often has nice deals on wines. if you're just learning or trying to figure out what you like, trader joe's has inexpensive wines.

here's a decent story by eric asimov on wine and learning:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/11/dining/11pour.html?ex=1179892800&en=4b17d5b20b6f3196&ei=5087

and the follow-up story:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/09/dining/09pour.html?ref=dining

i also like these italian reds: barbera, nebbiolo and barolo. whole foods had a decent 'baby' barbera in the $10 range last week. i also like south american reds.

along with some of the good advice on this thread, a good bottle of wine doesn't have to cost $20 or more. if you like it, that's what matters. i have no qualms about putting away a bottle of three-buck chuck or buying a bottle based on the label.