What do you do with wine you don't like?

Bob_Hughes · February 21, 2020, 9:43pm

Hell, you’ve got bigger problems to worry about than a few bottles of wine you don’t care for -

>>>>My fiancee doesn’t drink at all,<<<<

IMO, find a fiancee who does drink - and who knows, she may like the wines you don’t, solving both of your issues

Shay_h_arnoy · February 21, 2020, 9:51pm

Gift to your neighbors or co-workers. I would be psyched to get a random bottle unexpectedly.

Jay_Miller · February 21, 2020, 9:57pm

I’ll point you to the short ribs thread on epicurean exploits. Every pot of shirt ribs takes three bottles of red wine…

Mike_R1 · February 21, 2020, 10:05pm

Hahaha

I’m not sure how well Pinot and Syrah will do in short ribs, but I don’t have anything to lose, so might give this a try!

Haha, I do wish that she enjoyed wine, but trust me, I’m the luckiest guy on the planet. I can’t believe that she even talks to me, let alone agreed to marry me.

Brian_Tuite · February 21, 2020, 10:11pm

Nobody has asked the tough question yet.

Have you stopped buying for WTSO, LastBottle etc?

Mike_R1 · February 21, 2020, 10:18pm

I will admit that I do still check those sites regularly, but I have stopped buying things that I don’t know anything about. The last thing I bought was a few bottles I liked during their marathon sale. My newest guilty pleasure is buying things I like on Vivino when they send me targeted emails for sales on bottles or producers I know I like. I live in NYC so wine stores here are insanely expensive, I buy almost everything online as it’s almost always cheaper than locally. That said, I learned a lot from that site in terms of trying a bunch of different wines I wouldn’t have otherwise, to learn what I do and don’t like.

MChang · February 21, 2020, 11:00pm

???

MarkStDBA · February 21, 2020, 11:05pm

GregT · February 21, 2020, 11:16pm

These individual bottles typically cost in the $30 range and come from random purchases of wines I’m not familiar with on sites like LastBottle or WTSO, where I will buy 2-3 bottles when ordering, either to get free shipping or simply because I don’t like buying only one of something that I can’t find locally.

This is your problem. You’re buying multiple bottles of wine you don’t know and you’re paying $30 or so. That’s nuts. Doesn’t matter if you can’t get them locally or not. To get the free shipping at $30 each, you’re buying three or four or six bottles. There’s no sense in paying $120 or more to get free shipping on bottles you don’t know. Buy a single bottle if you need to. And pay the shipping on it. Next time it comes around, and it will ninety percent of the time, then you know what to order.

You’re better off paying a high markup at a local place or restaurant and you’ll still come out ahead and you won’t have bottles you don’t want.

So my advice is:

Stop putting in those orders
Look around locally and ask the somms at restaurants where they’d buy wine retail.
Look online for free shipping deals - there are some retailers who offer free shipping on select wines. Wine Library offers a Library Pass for $99 and then it’s free shipping for a year. You can try a lot of different wines at various price points that way.

And more directly responding to the OP:

Step up your cooking - I don’t know how most people cook but I can never have enough cooking wine.
Look into making your own vinegar. It takes longer than making yogurt but you can end up with some good stuff.
Don’t ignore sangria in the warmer months. Some shitty wine makes good sangria.
Family, friends, and strangers.
Don’t waste time trying to sell it. You’re not going to find a lot of buyers for small quantities of $30 wine with poor provenance.

Whatever you do, good luck!

JDavisRoby · February 21, 2020, 11:23pm

About once a year I pull a case or two of these types of wines and donate to a local charity event or school pta fundraiser. You’re a hero for helping them fill up their wine pull with wines that aren’t swill and costs more than $20.

Philip_G · February 22, 2020, 1:31am

This. You can then write off the wine and shipping costs on your taxes.

I have a fundraiser event I’m supporting and donating wine to in May. If you’re interested in possibly donating PM me.

Markus_S · February 22, 2020, 2:29am

Gift, to your doorperson, friends, family, homeless, coworkers, stagehands at the play you just saw, ticket-takers at some random performance, tollbooth cash operators, the garbargeman…be creative! Those bottles will be GONE in a flash!

Wes_Barton · February 22, 2020, 3:54am

Not when Sally, who doesn’t drink, is glaring at you all evening.

JDavisRoby · February 22, 2020, 4:17am

Sally is the wine version of Karen?

lleichtman · February 22, 2020, 6:41am

I have amassed a decent number of individual bottles in my collection that I don’t care for. These individual bottles typically cost in the $30 range and come from random purchases of wines I’m not familiar with on sites like LastBottle or WTSO, where I will buy 2-3 bottles when ordering, either to get free shipping or simply because I don’t like buying only one of something that I can’t find locally. I live in a city in a smaller 1BR apartment, so neither we nor our friends really ever host dinner parties, its more of a meet at the restaurant type of city. I don’t have much room for wine storage (limited to a small wine fridge that holds 20 bottles). I find myself not wanting to just dump these bottles, but I also want to save some room and drink what I enjoy. I try to limit my wine consumption to 2 bottles a week, so it’s exhausting thinking of how long it will take me to get through these all, especially considering I don’t care for them. What do you guys do when you have wines you know you don’t want to drink, and there is no market to sell them?

Throw a barbecue and put them out. They will be drunk.

lleichtman · February 22, 2020, 6:43am

These individual bottles typically cost in the $30 range and come from random purchases of wines I’m not familiar with on sites like LastBottle or WTSO, where I will buy 2-3 bottles when ordering, either to get free shipping or simply because I don’t like buying only one of something that I can’t find locally.

This is your problem. You’re buying multiple bottles of wine you don’t know and you’re paying $30 or so. That’s nuts. Doesn’t matter if you can’t get them locally or not. To get the free shipping at $30 each, you’re buying three or four or six bottles. There’s no sense in paying $120 or more to get free shipping on bottles you don’t know. Buy a single bottle if you need to. And pay the shipping on it. Next time it comes around, and it will ninety percent of the time, then you know what to order.

You’re better off paying a high markup at a local place or restaurant and you’ll still come out ahead and you won’t have bottles you don’t want.

So my advice is:

Stop putting in those orders

Look around locally and ask the somms at restaurants where they’d buy wine retail.

Look online for free shipping deals - there are some retailers who offer free shipping on select wines. Wine Library offers a Library Pass for $99 and then it’s free shipping for a year. You can try a lot of different wines at various price points that way.

I find it easy to make Balsamic if you start with a good Balsamic first and add unwanted wine to the crock. We use these in a reduced fashion for cooking many things and it comes out great.
And more directly responding to the OP:

Step up your cooking - I don’t know how most people cook but I can never have enough cooking wine.

Look into making your own vinegar. It takes longer than making yogurt but you can end up with some good stuff.

Don’t ignore sangria in the warmer months. Some shitty wine makes good sangria.

Family, friends, and strangers.

Don’t waste time trying to sell it. You’re not going to find a lot of buyers for small quantities of $30 wine with poor provenance.

Whatever you do, good luck!

Larry_Chmel · February 22, 2020, 12:28pm

+1

Sherr1_Shap1r0 · February 22, 2020, 1:23pm

Lots of good answers here. When I read the OP, I also thought to cook with some and gift the rest. You live in apt building so you probably don’t have lots of workers who come to your place, but you must have a super, maybe a few doormen, a cleaning person? People at work who go out of their way? Someone who cuts your hair, a receptionist at your doctor/dentist who gets you in at the last minute? Give it away and learn from the buying mistakes you made.

Neal.Mollen · February 22, 2020, 5:55pm

These individual bottles typically cost in the $30 range and come from random purchases of wines I’m not familiar with on sites like LastBottle or WTSO, where I will buy 2-3 bottles when ordering, either to get free shipping or simply because I don’t like buying only one of something that I can’t find locally.

This is your problem. You’re buying multiple bottles of wine you don’t know and you’re paying $30 or so. That’s nuts. Doesn’t matter if you can’t get them locally or not. To get the free shipping at $30 each, you’re buying three or four or six bottles. There’s no sense in paying $120 or more to get free shipping on bottles you don’t know. Buy a single bottle if you need to. And pay the shipping on it. Next time it comes around, and it will ninety percent of the time, then you know what to order.

You’re better off paying a high markup at a local place or restaurant and you’ll still come out ahead and you won’t have bottles you don’t want.

So my advice is:

Stop putting in those orders

Look around locally and ask the somms at restaurants where they’d buy wine retail.

Look online for free shipping deals - there are some retailers who offer free shipping on select wines. Wine Library offers a Library Pass for $99 and then it’s free shipping for a year. You can try a lot of different wines at various price points that way.

And more directly responding to the OP:

Step up your cooking - I don’t know how most people cook but I can never have enough cooking wine.

Look into making your own vinegar. It takes longer than making yogurt but you can end up with some good stuff.

Don’t ignore sangria in the warmer months. Some shitty wine makes good sangria.

Family, friends, and strangers.

Don’t waste time trying to sell it. You’re not going to find a lot of buyers for small quantities of $30 wine with poor provenance.

Whatever you do, good luck!

Don’t tell him I said so but Greg has your answers here

BobMilton · February 23, 2020, 12:51am

Let’s change this up a bit. You by wine on Berserker Day that you’ve never had. When I get it I decide it’s not my thing. I can cook with it or gift to someone who might like it. BUT do I stop buying wine I’ve never had on Berserker Day? No me, by the way.