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July 2, 2009

Helpful advice from the front porch

The best thing to do with cheap wine is make sangria with it.
Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:18 PM | | Comments (15)
        

Comments

She's finally beginning to take her vacation seriously.

Posted by: Laura Lee | July 2, 2009 6:39 PM

True -- but does Two Buck Chuck make drinkable sangria?

Posted by: hmpstd | July 2, 2009 7:16 PM

I only tried cheap Trader Joe wine one time (in Newport News, VA), and did not find it drinkable at all. Maybe it might have survived as sangrai, but I wouldn't bet money on it.

I tried the sauvignon blanc and had to spit it out. I've never spit wine out before (except at a wine tasting). EL

Posted by: Hal Laurent | July 2, 2009 7:23 PM

My brother loves sangria, but I don't know what he uses for the base wine.

Posted by: PCB Rob | July 2, 2009 7:26 PM

A recent New Yorker had an article about Two Buck Chuck, which helped to explain why it is so variable--and so cheap. A lot of it is mixed together "excess" wine from places other than Napa.

Posted by: Dahlink | July 2, 2009 7:27 PM

FALSE! It also makes a wonderful deer marinade!

Posted by: Joyce W. | July 2, 2009 7:46 PM

I wonder how 'Bird or Ripple would do in a sangria? Does it matter whether it's tinto o blanco?

Posted by: bill | July 2, 2009 10:04 PM

Ackshully, Elizabeth, you can also make a spritzer with your cheap red and 7-Up or Sprite. It' kinda reminds me of Arbor Mist or Wild Vines.

Posted by: Dottie | July 3, 2009 12:15 AM

Dottie--gack!

Posted by: Dahlink | July 3, 2009 6:49 AM

For those of us who drink wine with every meal (sans breakfast,) in hopes of outliving Methusela, $80 Pommards and Beaunes would soon wipe us out. Better to enjoy the local equivalent of the Chateau Thames Embankment that fictional British barrister Horace Rumpole used to "slosh down" after a hard day keeping criminals out of the nick. In other words, a nice 1.5 liter Debouef Vin Ordinaire or Chilean Cabernet.

Posted by: Michael A. Gray | July 3, 2009 6:58 AM

You know, Dottie, this is the first time in a long time that someone has come up with an alcoholic drink that I didn't regret not being able to try.

Posted by: Lissa | July 3, 2009 7:20 AM

MAG, you don't have to spend $80/bottle for drinkable wine. You have to spend more than $2, though. Actually, the TJ wine I had was more like 4 or 5 bucks, and it was still awful.

Posted by: Hal Laurent | July 3, 2009 8:59 AM

Finally, I can make an Arbor Mist at home. Now, I can move on to recreating the Riblets from Applebees in the comfort of my kitchen.

Posted by: Robert of Cross Keys | July 3, 2009 10:16 AM

Decades ago when my husband and I were first married, we lived in Switzerland. The local grocery store carried cheap wines. The cheapest was a red wine simply labeled "Vin Etrangere." It cost 2 Swiss frances (less than a dollar) and it never tasted the same from bottle to bottle.
Sometimes it even tasted as if it was made from grapes.

Posted by: Dahlink | July 3, 2009 10:26 AM

Old Playboy cartoon:

Man is walking past a Wine and Spirits store looking at a sign that says "For the man who'll drink anything - $2 a gallon."

Posted by: Retired in Elkridge | July 3, 2009 5:33 PM

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About this blog
Richard Gorelick was appointed The Baltimore Sun's restaurant critic in September 2010. Before joining the paper staff fulltime, he contributed freelance criticism and features articles about food to area and regional publications. Along the way, he dispatched for short-distance trucking companies, shilled for cultural non-profits, and assisted in cognitive neurology research – never the subject, always the control.

He takes restaurants seriously but not himself, and his favorite restaurant is the one you love, too.
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