Cooking wine or sherry recommendations requested

littlemoney

I want to experiment with added wine or sherry to some cooking. I don't drink so I don't have any bottles I could try.

I understand that the cooking version of red wine and sherry contain preservatives so opened bottles keep longer.

I wouldn't know the difference between different ones and don't know what would be a cheap but good one to use in cookery. Don't want to spend too much in case I don't like it and pour it down the drain.

Any suggestions of what I should buy please. Thank you

DullGreyGuy

I have never heard of "cooking sherry" and "cooking wine" should be avoided like the plague. 

The old adage is if it isn't good enough to drink then it isn't good enough to cook with. However you dont want to put a £200 Brunello into a steak and red wine stew. 

If you aren't using a whole bottle in the recipe/ dont have people that want to drink it then freeze the rest of it in ice cubes. Once they're frozen you can release them from the tray, stick them in a bag and keep it in the freezer for months. Next time you want to cook with it take out the appropriate number of cubes. In most cases you can just put them straight in the pan rather than needing to defrost them first. (just dont accidentally put them in the kids coke)


What wine you will want will depend on what you are cooking... white or red at a minimum but red in particular ranges from light through to very heavy the later clearly being better for the heavy red meat stews etc.

Sherry is an even broader catagory than wine. In principle the freezing approach could apply to it too. 

CapricornLass

I think the best way forward is to buy the little tiny bottles of wine, the ones that hold one or two glasses, rather than the standard wine bottles of cooking sherry or wine.  The likelihood is that you will empty said bottle into whatever it is you are cooking, and unopened bottles will last far longer than any larger bottle with preservatives.  I also suspect that you would have only a limited amount of time to use said cooking bottle up once it had been opened.

Its not the cheapest way to buy wine, but both my son, who lives alone and cooks for himself, and I (cooking for 3 adults) find that this way results in the least waste. You don't need to buy the most expensive bottles, cheap Spanish plonk will do. There are usually offers on too, buy four bottles for the price of three type of thing, which will help bring down the overall cost.

bouicca21

I suppose it depends on your definition of cheap.  I really like a good gutsy red wine and happily pay more for a good one.  If red wine is good enough to drink I most certainly don’t cook with it.  I use red wine in stews and it’s about tenderising as well as flavour, so cheap plonk it is, the sort that is 6 or 7 quid or even less a bottle.  I’ll be doing ox kidney and ox cheek in wine next week and if I used a decent wine it would cost more than the meat.  If I don’t use a whole bottle I freeze the left overs.

I hate cheap white wine, no flavour, too astringent, so where the recipe calls for white wine/sherry (mostly risotto) I use own brand manzanilla from Waitrose.  Now that is ok for drinking.  As a singleton i am making single portions so I don’t use much and it keeps well for ages in the fridge.

Brambling

I agree that the small bottles are idea for cooking for one even if they work out more expensive pre 100ml.  I keep a bottle of port and a bottle of dry vermouth and both are good substitute for wine, just use less and keep a long time.  

Floss

I keep a bottle of Aldi dry sherry in the cupboard with my oils etc, and add a glue (around a tablespoon-ish) to gravies, casseroles, sauces etc. This cooking sherry bottle is kept in the dark & lasts for ages. The drinking sherry however does not...

DullGreyGuy

Get the feeling a lot are missing out on the difference between using half decent wine and industrial alcohol infused grape juice.

Our local small plates restaurants even makes their own vinegar out of the left over bits of bottles from customers because they say it has so much more flavour than mass market wine vinegars... I thought that may be stretching things a bit, never thought anyone would honestly say the cheapest rubbish you can buy makes the same quality food as something around the £8-£10 mark. 

ZsaZsa

I don’t really drink so we tend not to buy specifically for cooking. However, every so often we’ll be gifted a bottle of port so that’s used in the kitchen. No problem with it lasting once open.

goldfinches

It very much depends on what you're making but here is my general principle for choosing which wine to use.

I go by the cuisine the recipe I'm making originates from e.g. for a bolognese or a risotto use an Italian wine and for things like chilli get as near as you can geographically e.g. Californian wine.

I agree with those above who say that they think that the small bottles would be best for trying especially as there's a huge selection available nowadays and they all tell you where they originate and give you notes about how they taste. 

For fortified wines like port and vermouth I usually buy the Sainsby's or T*sco own brand which are always good but for the sherry I avoid all the British sherry and choose one of the own brand Spanish named sherries suitable for whatever I'm making which the recipe will usually tell you. If the recipe doesn't specify be very wary because the difference in flavour and sweetness between fino and pedro ximenez for instance is huge and might spoil everything.
Sherry isn't generally available in less than 70cl bottles but it does keep fairly well once opened and you can get things like a vacuvin stopper to prolong its life. 

JIL

I agree the small bottles are the best and aldi sell them.

I also use the wine stockpots that m and s sell. They work really well and no worries about waste or storage. 

joedenise

Even though we do drink we don't often have a bottle open when I need it so quite often just use the wine stockpots.  Can buy these in Tescos and Morrisons and wouldn't be surprised if you can also get them in the other supermarkets.