Fine(ish) Wines - where to buy
Discussion
I like wine, a lot. But I have got into this bad habit of picking up wine in the supermarket based mostly on ones I know wont give me a hangover so I can drink more of them, and just basically guzzling cheapish wines and getting pissed.
Im having a period of abstinence now to lose some weight, but I dont want to give up for good. I would like to be a bit more discerning and buy some much better wine, and drink a lot less of it. Im thinking instead of the ~£10 supermarket plonk I am thinking more around the £30 mark and have as treat on Friday or Saturday night.
Where is best to buy these? Waitrose has a fine wine section but they all seem to be stored upright and I have had some corked wines from them before. Are Majestic any good? What about Naked wines or the Virgin wines that are delivered? It would be nice if they came with some sort tasting notes as well, I dont want to become a total bellend and be swilling wine around and sniffing it for half an hour, but would be nice if it had a little card telling me what I should be tasting and why. Also while I want to try some new things I dont want a completely random selection of stuff, I prefer European to New World for example, thats personal taste, not snobbery.
Im having a period of abstinence now to lose some weight, but I dont want to give up for good. I would like to be a bit more discerning and buy some much better wine, and drink a lot less of it. Im thinking instead of the ~£10 supermarket plonk I am thinking more around the £30 mark and have as treat on Friday or Saturday night.
Where is best to buy these? Waitrose has a fine wine section but they all seem to be stored upright and I have had some corked wines from them before. Are Majestic any good? What about Naked wines or the Virgin wines that are delivered? It would be nice if they came with some sort tasting notes as well, I dont want to become a total bellend and be swilling wine around and sniffing it for half an hour, but would be nice if it had a little card telling me what I should be tasting and why. Also while I want to try some new things I dont want a completely random selection of stuff, I prefer European to New World for example, thats personal taste, not snobbery.
I used to get wine from Laithwaites and that came with a little booklet of tasting notes, which was quite interesting. Not sure if their wine counts as "Fine-ish" or not, but they did do some very tasty reds from smaller European producers.
I liked getting their random selection box once month. Only stopped when we had kids and discovered that wine and babies didn't mix for both sleep and budget reasons.
I liked getting their random selection box once month. Only stopped when we had kids and discovered that wine and babies didn't mix for both sleep and budget reasons.
Voldemort said:
Brilliant, takes me back to the days when I was working near there. Remember getting a bottle of this for Chrsitmas around 20 years ago.https://www.laithwaites.co.uk/product/Red-Still+Wi...
Suspect there are very few people regret joining The Wine Society: https://www.thewinesociety.com/
£40 gets you lifetime membership, and no pressure at all to buy anything.
Good storage options too, with the ability to take out part cases.
£40 gets you lifetime membership, and no pressure at all to buy anything.
Good storage options too, with the ability to take out part cases.
Mercdriver said:
some of the wines at a tenner are very good.
Where there has also been tremendous value in the past is in buying some of their cheaper mixed, or en primeur mixed, cases and leaving them in their storage for a couple of years. Their own label wines are also pretty reliable. I could have written your post. I find myself in the same place. I've been really disappointed and bored with supermarket wines and have just stopped buying them. Reds seem to be generic high alcohol, high residual sugar, clichés. Whites are just dull.
I think if you're making the jump from £10 to £30 pounds and (I'm making an assumption here) you haven't got a lot of experience in the £10-30 range, this is where a relationship with a merchant might be helpful to steer you.
This is the kind of price point where the price quality ratio really flattens and, if you're a fan of an unfashionable grape/style (eg. rieslings, Beaujolais and red Loire wines), you can find wines which might be difficult to better at any price.
There will also be wines at £30 that are still shockingly poor value. Red and White Burgundy and New World mimics of this style I'm looking at you. This is the entry point for the big names in the Rhône (CNdP, Hermitage, Côte Rôtie) but these only start to be reliable buys at near double the budget. A random £30 big Rhône wine will be a gamble and you'd be better allowing yourself to be guided to a good maker in a less prestigious village.The same is true for the big Italian (Barolo, Barbaresco) and Spanish (Ribero del Duero) wines at around this price - the natives are prepared to pay for and hang on to the good stuff. Wines of this style might be made with an expectation of considerable ageing and can be a but challenging if drunk young.
Another shout for Wine Society. Also I've also been genuinely impressed with some English wines I've had although the Yorkshireman struggles with £15 for a 10.5% English wine.
On a final note, I think there is a very good case (geddit) for buying wines by the half dozen or dozen. I think for special wines its really disappointing to find there's no more available when you want to order again and I've often found that the second tasting of a disappointing wine is a pleasant surprise, especially if I've fine tuned the food pairing to match my initial impression.
I think if you're making the jump from £10 to £30 pounds and (I'm making an assumption here) you haven't got a lot of experience in the £10-30 range, this is where a relationship with a merchant might be helpful to steer you.
This is the kind of price point where the price quality ratio really flattens and, if you're a fan of an unfashionable grape/style (eg. rieslings, Beaujolais and red Loire wines), you can find wines which might be difficult to better at any price.
There will also be wines at £30 that are still shockingly poor value. Red and White Burgundy and New World mimics of this style I'm looking at you. This is the entry point for the big names in the Rhône (CNdP, Hermitage, Côte Rôtie) but these only start to be reliable buys at near double the budget. A random £30 big Rhône wine will be a gamble and you'd be better allowing yourself to be guided to a good maker in a less prestigious village.The same is true for the big Italian (Barolo, Barbaresco) and Spanish (Ribero del Duero) wines at around this price - the natives are prepared to pay for and hang on to the good stuff. Wines of this style might be made with an expectation of considerable ageing and can be a but challenging if drunk young.
Another shout for Wine Society. Also I've also been genuinely impressed with some English wines I've had although the Yorkshireman struggles with £15 for a 10.5% English wine.
On a final note, I think there is a very good case (geddit) for buying wines by the half dozen or dozen. I think for special wines its really disappointing to find there's no more available when you want to order again and I've often found that the second tasting of a disappointing wine is a pleasant surprise, especially if I've fine tuned the food pairing to match my initial impression.
brickwall said:
I use Farr Vintners. It’s like BBR but with a lower markup because you’re not paying for a shiny website and ultra-flash London premises.
Farrs probably aren’t what the OP is looking for? Minimum order value, delivery costs, and (mostly) case only sales put them in quite a different place to the likes of Wine Society or BBR. Their place isn’t quite as quaint as Berry’s but it’s exactly a hovel…They are very good to deal with and would also recommend to anyone for whom the way they do business works.
The other consideration is that some of the pricing on BBR is from their broking side, BBX, where it’s the client setting the price. Sometimes these are a little in the ambitious side!
oddman said:
There will also be wines at £30 that are still shockingly poor value. Red and White Burgundy and New World mimics of this style I'm looking at you. This is the entry point for the big names in the Rhône (CNdP, Hermitage, Côte Rôtie) but these only start to be reliable buys at near double the budget. A random £30 big Rhône wine will be a gamble and you'd be better allowing yourself to be guided to a good maker in a less prestigious village.The same is true for the big Italian (Barolo, Barbaresco) and Spanish (Ribero del Duero) wines at around this price - the natives are prepared to pay for and hang on to the good stuff. Wines of this style might be made with an expectation of considerable ageing and can be a but challenging if drunk young.
Spot on. Regions are important but there are real challenges for “cheaper” producers in expensive areas. Quite simply, the top guys usually own or buy the best land/fruit and have the cash to invest in making it something special. They then charge for that. There’s some care needed though. MC’s mention of “next door to” type marketing highlights something I don’t really like, namely the suggestion that the output is somehow comparable to that of their neighbours. Kind of like me setting up a car factory near Maranello and suggesting it’s a bit like Ferrari… not necessarily going to the be the case and feels like a lazy attempt to hang onto the coat tails of others.
Step a little way outside the top appellations and you can find some good producers who don’t have the same capital/input costs. The top end wines can be phenomenal, when they’re ready/on form, but there are really enjoyable wines from the smaller Rhone appellations and away from the Bordeaux classifications.
Thanks all, some good options there. Wine club does look good.
I found a local Italian deli that has a fine wine selection. However, I bought some pizza sauce from them once and when I got home I realised it was long out of date, so not sure how good their stock handling is. The food they serve is delicious mind.
I found a local Italian deli that has a fine wine selection. However, I bought some pizza sauce from them once and when I got home I realised it was long out of date, so not sure how good their stock handling is. The food they serve is delicious mind.
To find wines you really enjoy is not about changing the price but about learning more about wines and what you like - do you prefer certain grapes / more or less alcohol or tannins / whites - sweeter or drier?
Several ways to do this - you could do a WSET course, find a local wine merchant who can structure purchases to help you work out what you like / read online (https://winefolly.com/ or wine-pages.com for two very different approaches to learning)
Then also consider that some wines are made to be consumed now (most whites) others mature in the bottle and have different drinking windows - often early, then close down, then open up again… so buying wines young and storing them correctly until they mature can be a cheaper way of drinking more expensive wines - it gives a very different approach to buying this year’s crop only - we recently had a dinner comparing various burgandies from 2018 against the same regions from 1971 - fascinating how they change…
But don’t knock supermarkets, once you understand more about what you like they can provide some superb bargains
Several ways to do this - you could do a WSET course, find a local wine merchant who can structure purchases to help you work out what you like / read online (https://winefolly.com/ or wine-pages.com for two very different approaches to learning)
Then also consider that some wines are made to be consumed now (most whites) others mature in the bottle and have different drinking windows - often early, then close down, then open up again… so buying wines young and storing them correctly until they mature can be a cheaper way of drinking more expensive wines - it gives a very different approach to buying this year’s crop only - we recently had a dinner comparing various burgandies from 2018 against the same regions from 1971 - fascinating how they change…
But don’t knock supermarkets, once you understand more about what you like they can provide some superb bargains
akirk said:
To find wines you really enjoy is not about changing the price but about learning more about wines and what you like - do you prefer certain grapes / more or less alcohol or tannins / whites - sweeter or drier?
Preference is important, but you can't get away from the fixed costs, tax, etc and the impact these have on what's left for the winemaker to grow/harvest or buy fruit and work his or her magic:
(https://www.bibendum-wine.co.uk/news-stories/articles/wine/uk-wine-duty-explained-vinonomics/)
In the case of the OP, going from £10 to £30/bt the winemaker is going to have around 4x, maybe more, to work with.
Of course there's a point at which diminishing returns kicks in... and that point is personal for everyone and, as you say, people should always aim to buy wines they like. Far better than buying "better" wines that they don't.
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