No, I’m not trying to create a thread guaranteed to be of no interest to Berserkers. I ran out of white cooking wine, went to the supermarket and scoured the bottom shelf for the bottom price. Chilled it out of reflex, and of course poured a taste before pouring it in the pan. Wound up drinking a glass.
NV Rock and Roots Chardonnay, Spain
Light gold color. Aromas are fresh, broad and clean, simple with apple hints. The palate offers surprising texture, as if this were cropped at maybe 6 tons/acre instead of 12 or 18. The flavors are balanced, with a note of some maturity (it’s NV, the lot # starts with 23, so I’m guessing mostly 2022 vintage with maybe some older wine). This is better than pleasant, more going on than in current renditions of Fetzer ‘Sundial’ and comparable in quality to Wente ‘Morning Fog’… in other words, a good pleasant glass of Chardonnay with some character. Rated 86.5.
Maybe this could have gone into the “Current State of the Wine Market” thread. I can only guess this is made from what amounts to surplus grapes coming out of Spain. I noticed a Chardonnay made by Enate for the supermarket Mercadona selling for 3.50 euros. Maybe they’re the same wine.
As you know, Dan, freight alone takes over $2/btl just to ship from Spain and get it on a store shelf in the US before the COGS and any potential profit are factored in. Hard to imagine how anyone is making enough money on this to make it worthwhile.
Are we entering a golden surplus age for the wine consumer?
I grade on my unfamous 32 point scale:
<80 - 84: 6 possible grades, no subdivisions
85 - 94.5: 20 possible grades, points and half points
95 - 100: 6 possible grades, no subdivisions
Two-buck Chuck is a perfect cooking wine. As long as the wine is technically dry, quality of it doesn’t play much role in the end product. Kenji did a pretty good test and debunked the “only cook with what you want to drink” myth.
I wonder if they are shipping it bulk in tank and bottling closer to market to help the profit equation. Was there a capsule on it? Bottled in 750mL or larger format?
Yep, 750 under capsule. Not sure where bottling is done.
In Europe, the €3.5 price is feasible, especially if a retailer is buying direct. I used to buy a perfectly fine red and a white out of Landes for €1.2/btl and that was just by the pallet from a smallish producer. If a chain store could take 60,000/btls and get ex cellar down to €1.10 that leaves a pretty healthy margin to retail at 3.50 even with factoring in local freight.
It needs to be trucked to the port, then shipped to the US, then trucked to the warehouse (including load-in fees), then, in much smaller quantities, delivered to the retailer. Plus import taxes and duties.
There are ways to lower marginally lower it such as shipping with only a “thermal blanket” instead of refer. Wouldn’t be surprised if that’s how they ship. Also if the distributor has their own warehouse and trucks that will lower it even more.