Under $15 And Hard To Ignore Wines

Everyone has their vacation from hell story, mine happened a couple weeks ago. Just so we can get to the wine part of this article as quick as possible I’ll summarize:

-Wedding in Portland, Maine.

-Serious muscle damage to my left bicep/shoulder

-Trip to local Walgreens for anti-inflammatories

-Drive home to Toronto after spending a tortuous evening at our hotel

-20 hours of driving

-No lobster, no crab cakes, no wedding.

In the middle of this 30-hour ordeal there was one positive. A box of wine. More specifically it was a box of “Black Box” Chardonnay that I spotted while loading up on drugs at the Walgreens. I remember the cashier giving my girlfriend and me a funny look when my checkout consisted of three bottles of pills and one box of wine. But I didn’t care, my arm was killing me and the wine was on sale! ($15.95) This box almost caused an incident at the border when the guard informed me that technically we were over the limit of alcohol allowed to be brought over the border. He was kind enough to let us pass, and now that box is sitting in my fridge.

I bring all this up because this column is all in praise of cheap wine. I know the word “cheap” brings negative connotations. However, just because a wine is not expensive does not mean it isn’t well made. All the wines I mention are damn good— hell, far better than the cheap crap you’ll often encounter at a wedding or at intermissions of most theatre. I’m going to continue to use the word “cheap” in this piece as I find the use of “inexpensive” feels more like you’re hiding something. And there is nothing wrong with good cheap wine. Unless you’re super rich you need to have an army of under $15 wines to get you through your hectic work week.

So before we get to any specific producers let’s talk about the most important factor when it comes to finding good cheap wine: geography. There are many reasons why a bottle of wine costs what it does, and geography is near the top of the list. The grapes for that bottle of Burgundy or Napa Cabernet are grown on some pretty expensive land. The average price-per-acre of vineyard land in Burgundy will set you back by over $80,000! So to get that cheap bottle you will have to say goodbye to the most famous wine locations like Bordeaux, Burgundy, Barolo and other places that don’t start with the letter “B” such as Napa and Sonoma. 

If you start checking out lists from magazines like Wine Spectator and Decanter to more home-grown options like WineAlign.com you will see begin to notice the same regions consistently pop up when they put out their “Top Value Wines” lists.

Some of the most common areas you will find are:

Colchagua Valley in Chili.

The Mendoza province in Argentina

The Western Clape area in South Africa

The regions of Abruzzo and Puglia in Italy

What all these regions have in common is cheaper labour and cheaper real estate than some of their more famous neighbours. I wish there was some mysterious/sexier reason for why wine costs what it does, but just like most other facets in life the cost of that bottle is based on pure economics.

Some quick thoughts and recommendations for each of these areas. One of my favourite Chilean wine producers is Cono Sur. They source their grapes from all over Chile, and the Colchagua Valley is no exception. Because they produce vast amounts of wine you should be able to find their product wherever you live. My favourite is their Viognier which goes for around $10. 

What makes this wine so special is that it possesses the most important trait that any wine can have, Varietal Typicity. I capitalized this term on purpose, because if you take anything away from this article it should be this part. This term basically means does the wine taste how it is supposed to? The worst sin of cheap wine is that it tastes like non-descript alcoholic juice. I have had litres of sugary, chemical filled Merlot that had almost no defining characteristic beyond it got me drunk as I was trying to figure out what the flavour was. 

Back to the Cono Sur Viognier. It is filled with peach and flowers like any good Viognier should. Oh sure, it doesn’t have the depth of some of the better versions of Viognier that you find in Northern Rhone. But it’s also about $50 bucks cheaper. They also do a Pinot Noir that gives you just enough funk on the nose and red-cherry notes. You can tell you are drinking a Pinot Noir and not some sort of bland mix of Cabernet and Merlot where you really have no idea what you’re drinking.

]Moving on. Try a bunch of Malbecs from Mendoza. Some may be a bit overly fruity, but that will only be a $12 mistake and eventually you will find some powerful/spicy options that go great with barbeque. 

If you want to explore South Africa look for their white wine, Chenin Blanc. This area is famous for it and a good bottle of Chenin is both refreshing and has enough body/depth to act as a cheaper alternative to Chardonnay. Not to go off on another aside, but you will need to say goodbye to some of your favourite grapes when looking for that $10- $15 bottle. Simple fact is that Chardonnay on average is more expensive than just about any other grape, so finding that good bottle of Chenin will be critical.

Finally, the grape you will be looking for in Abruzzo and Puglia is the hard-to-pronounce Negroamaro. These wines, when done well, will be filled with dark cherry, rustic notes and plenty of spice. They’re not the types of wines that you will brood over after each sip, but quite frankly— who cares if it tastes good and costs less than a bag of avocados?

I will wrap this up with a couple more quick tips:

1-I generally avoid California wine as the real estate prices and state taxes jack up the price of your average bottle. But if you need your Cali fix I recommend Castle Rock. They own no vineyards which help control the costs. They consistently win awards for value so you can get your Chardonnay or Pinot Noir for under $20.

2-Try the Columbia Crest series of wines from Washington State. Good source of Merlot

3-My favourite cheap Chianti producer is Rocca Delle Macie. They’re a great source for sub-$15 Chianti, and you should be able to find them all over Canada

4-If you are exploring Portugal look for Touriga Nacional. It is the closest thing they have to an internationally well-known grape that can produce some complex dry red Portuguese wines.

Happy (cheap) hunting!