Tonight my friend said it was my turn to buy the wine. I went to the supermarket and got smacked in the face by option paralysis.
My friend gave me some key words to look for.
In the end we got two bottles. One for a fiver and one for €9. So far we've opened the cheap one and it's entirely drinkable.
Mission accomplished.
@DrHyde yes. This matches my experience
@DrHyde @quixoticgeek generally when in the UK, I found that the Spanish wines available were cheaper sometimes worryingly so, than their French or Italian equivalents, especially on the sparkling side of things. A 12 quid Cava is equivalent to about a 30 quid Champagne if not more.
The problem in the UK is that people have decided to enjoy varietals, so you go for a Merlot or a Pinot, or a Chardonnay, and Spanish wines don’t tend to use French varietals, and in fact are generally blends of Tempranillo and Garnacha.
To be honest, any of the wines in that photo are likely to be pretty drinkable. It’s what we drink over here. You’re likely to be able to find the following in the UK:
- Cune
- Faustino V (Wetherspoons had this as their only drinkable wine for a while)
- Campo Viejo
- Marqués de Cáceres
Just make sure it says “Crianza” or “Reserva” on the bottle - it indicates that they have been aged at least 2 and 3 years in oak respectively.
@quixoticgeek I just go for new world wines because they're less expensive and how can being allowed to water your vines be a bad thing?
@bracken keep in mind that @quixoticgeek was in a Spanish supermarket. New world wines are very unlikely to be found there (and if they are, it’ll be expensive Argentinian wine)
@moof @quixoticgeek Ah, in that case the Spanish wines will be like 1/8th the price they are here.
@quixoticgeek @moof €14.10, not nearly as bad as I expected.
@bracken @quixoticgeek that’s not too bad, given how big the difference in duty and transport is. It’s not bad introduction to Spanish wine.
@quixoticgeek these were amazing choices of wine. I enjoyed them thoroughly
@quixoticgeek I'm not keen on Spanish wines, but I think that's mostly because I don't know what key words to look for, and because the greedy buggers keep the good stuff for themselves.