A while back a friend of mine asked me what I thought would make the ultimate $100 cellar. Fancy wine’s not cheap and there’s so much good stuff to chose from. I thought about variety and balance. You’d need some reds, of course, but also some whites. You’d want to be able to pair with different kinds of food.
After much deliberation, I came up with the following list:
- Turnbull Estate Grown Cabernet Sauvignon ($34), an amazingly rich, fruit-forward cab that rivals competitors at twice the price
- Mollydooker Shiraz ‘The Boxer’($20), classic Aussie Shiraz concentrate almost sweet with oak vanilin
- Rombauer Napa Valley Chardonnay ($27), heroin for Chardonnay addicts
- Van Volxem Saar Riesling ($17), delicious off-dry lemon and apricot that pairs with almost anything
That got me up to $98. Say what you will, but there’s really no other choice for that last $2: the infamous Two-Buck Chuck itself…
- Charles Shaw Cabernet ($2), smooth and easy drinker consistent across vintages
Okay, new vintages have been released since I originally priced this list and some have gone up. But still, it was a perfect $100. I’m a genius, right?
Then I thought about it some more…
tableauvivante
Inspector Vino
