How cheap can good wine be?

[Anders_Westholm]

My cellar includes about a hundred bottles with a price tag as low as 5 to 7 euro. Grapes include Arneis, Favorita (Vermentino), Grüner Veltliner, Muscat, Riesling, Sauvignon Blanc, and Scheurebe on the white side and Aglianico, Barbera, Blaufränkisch, Dolcetto, Pinot Noir, and Tempranillo on the red. However, these bottlings are quite carefully chosen and in many cases bought ex-cellar or in the vicinity of the production area. They are for the most part not wines I could easily grab off the shelves just about anywhere or for the price I paid.

[Eric_Ifune]

I remember in Northern Italy a few years ago getting pretty decent wines from a local Coop for less than a euro/liter. Not anonymous blends, but local Merlot, Cabernet, and Sauvignon Blanc. You’d drive up with your demijohn and pump like a gas station. In Portugal you can get really excellent bottled wines for well under 4 euros from the Dao and Alentejo.

[Paul_Flynn]

Patrician Green Berserker’s Cuvee Pinot Noir, $19.

[Albert_R]

@Markus S

Chat. St. Michelle? Meh. Rather have a Finger Lakes riesling at around $15-18 bottle.
Speaking of that price range, I think that is a sweet spot for many wines, pinot noir excluded (like decent nebbiolo, $30 seems to be the entry price). Think the last time I found an under 10 pinot was back in the old days of Rex Goliath before it got really huge.
Heck, even good Muscadet is going above $15 now!
As for cabernet, why would you even look to California when you have petit chateau from Bordeaux that blow rings around anything from the Golden State at the lower price points (and here, I mean anything from $12-16)?

Which particular petit chateau’s do you recommend?

[Michae1_P0wers]

$11.

[RichardFlack]

Sitting here in Canada with our excruciating taxes it’s frustrating to see these US prices.

Chanelling Hugh Johnson, I’d take ‘good’ to mean anything id happily accept a second (or third!) glass of at a dinner or whatever. Does not have to be great.

In Ontario for me that price point is probably in the $18 - $25 for most categories, Pinot Noir being more like $30. Under $18 hard to do (except possibly bin end sales).

Agree most of the suggestions above, especially Spain & Portugal, Nals Madrid Pinot Grigio, Assyrtiko, some Ont Chard, Riesling, Provence Rose. Drouhin-Vaudon Chablis, Languedoc Rousillon etc.

[Gerhard_P]

I have not the slightest problem to find really good wines between 8 and 12 € - here in Austria and also in Southern France.
Be it a good Sauvignon bl. or Morillon or Grüner Veltliner, a Blaufränkisch or Zweigelt - or a nice Cotes-du-Rhone or Languedoc …

[r_holland]

My wife and I mostly drink pinot noir. Meiomi at around $20/bottle I feel is an excellent deal if you like the more jammy California thing. Or Flowers or Gary Farrell at around $40. HOWEVER…We recently stumbled upon one from, of all places, Languedoc for $16/bottle. I feel it is almost as good as Flowers or Gary Farrell. Tomorrow we are going back to buy a case. The wine is called La Dauphine Chloe. Pays D’ Oc.