Cheapest red wine?

MysteryMe

That Tesco wine is only 8% ABV so one reason it is cheap is because the alcohol content is low.

If you like drinking it then carry on buying it, as long as you like it that is all that matters.

Alcohol content plays a part in determining price as there is higher tax and duty the higher the ABV %

The growing process determines price, a wine that has been aged for a few years in going to cost more than one that hasn't.

Some grapes can only be grown is a certain area which limits production so usual supply and demand rules apply.

silverwhistle

MysteryMe wrote: »

Some grapes can only be grown is a certain area which limits production so usual supply and demand rules apply.

To expand on this take a common supermarket white wine from the Pinot Grigio grape as grown in northern Italy. The grapes for such a wine will be high yielding and on the plain where mechanisation is easier. The wine is easy drinking, probably not particularly high in alcohol and lacking complexity of flavour.


You'll pay quite a bit more for a Pinot Grigio from the hills where none of the above applies.


It's a bit like comparing processed cheese slices with a decent bit of mature cheddar.

esuhl

AG47 wrote: »

So what is the difference between cheap £3 bottle and a bottle much more than that?

Is it just the name? Taste?

They are both made from grapes, what is the fundamental difference

The taste tends to get better the more you spend.


There are a lot of reasons for that. Tastier grape varieties yield less and are more susceptible to disease; optimal wine-growing plots (climate, altitude, aspect, soil composition, etc.) are more expensive; expensive wines are stored for longer, omit preservatives and use natural corks (resulting in much more spoilage); and are produced in smaller quantities where demand outstrips supply.



At cheaper price points, supermarkets will often invent their own labels to make mass-produced wine look more "authentic". A common trick is to overprice it, and then repeatedly sell it "on offer" to artificially make it look better value/quality.



Most cheap wine in the UK contains preservatives like sulphur dioxide and potassium metabisulphite. I once went to an Italian family restaurant, and the owner said he'd return to Italy several times a year to buy local wines that were made without chemical preservatives. The wine was £10 a bottle (in a restaurant!) and tasted amazing... and didn't give me a headache or hangover like red wine normally does.


The problem with wine is that, if you get a taste for it, it can get expensive. At least good quality beer is cheap. :-)

silverwhistle

esuhl wrote: »

The problem with wine is that, if you get a taste for it, it can get expensive. At least good quality beer is cheap. :-)

Amen.


I used to live in Italy, in a mountain region where the wine was expensive. The guys from the local bar used to go to the next region on an annual basis to buy damigiani (demi-johns) of wine, for goodness knows how little per litre! Once I went to an anarchist community fund raising dinner in Turin and they were selling unlabelled bottles again for very little. Bl**dy excellent and long live the revolution I say.