I know this might sound a bit boring, but I have to confess that – although I do like the occasional glass of wine – I’m not really that big a drinker. This means that when I do tend to buy a bottle of wine, I don’t really buy the cheapest bottle on offer, as I kind of feel like I deserve to enjoy a good bottle on the times when I do buy one. Still, I don’t go wild either. I’m quite content to buy a nice bottle of Blossom hill or something like that. On average, I’d say I tend not to go over the £6 mark for a bottle but if I see a really good discount on an expensive bottle, then I don’t mind paying that bit more just to see if it would have been worth the full asking price or not.
How much do you need to spend?
This got me to thinking, how much do the majority of people spend on a bottle of wine on average, and where do they get it? As I say, Blossom Hill is usually the brand I’d go for and you can pick it up anywhere really. I know that a lot of my friends, however, are very complimentary of some of the cheaper wines you can find at Aldi or Lidl and they say that you can get some nice stuff for around £3.50 to £4 a bottle. Of course, I then have some other friends who wouldn’t be seen dead buying Aldi or Lidl’s own brand wines and would prefer to spend a little time hunting around to find deals on more upmarket brands or perhaps even head off to Waitrose*. I know some of my friends really wouldn’t think twice before spending £10 or even £20 on a bottle of wine and that does seem like quite a lot of money to me, especially if you’re buying it regularly. But then I might well feel differently if money wasn’t really an issue. Personally, I don’t mind what brand of wine I buy as long as it tastes nice and it doesn’t give me a whacking great headache in the morning!
What would you recommend?
So, now that you know how much I like to spend on a bottle of wine, perhaps you can recommend a few good bottles that I ought to be trying? Have you found a great budget bottle in Aldi or Lidl recently or on the other side of the coin, did you splash out and try a more expensive bottle that you thought was really worth the money? If you like red wines with quite a deep flavour, then I’d really recommend trying the French Malbec from Aldi which I think is priced at around £4.50, as I’ve found that to be a real bargain. Or, if you don’t mind spending a little bit more then there’s a red wine at Sainsbury’s that we really like called Roc De Chevalier which you can usually pick up for around £6 if it’s on offer. What about you though, what would you recommend?
This isn’t going to sound classy at all, but when I drink (which is rare), I usually opt for a Bota Box. Yes, it’s a boxed wine, but at $16 it’s a hell of a deal. The wine is actually pretty decent, for what it is. So if you’re on a tight budget but don’t want Two-Buck Chuck, that’s another alternative.