Worth the price tag?
Which famous wines are not worth their prices, and some good substitutes that are.
As you can tell from my byline, I am not a fan of overhyped wines. Paying for someone’s marketing won’t directly translate to a better tasting beverage, most of the time. While there are many wines out there that merit the price tags they fetch, there are a boat load that just don’t.
Here is my take on a few well known wines:
Ladies and Gentlemen, may I present Exhibit A. There is perhaps no more overpriced, overhyped, and uninspiring, badly made American wine. It is a linear juice and oak bomb that is unfortunately devoid of any structure or nuance. All you get for your hard earned $90 is thin, flat, fruit and oak.
If a big name Napa Valley wine appeals to you, try the Freemark Abbey instead. Priced a smidge above half the price, and ten times the quality. At an average cost of $50, this pedigreed wine blows Caymus away in terms of depth of flavor, balance, structure, and elegance.
2.-Santa Margherita Pinot Grigio Estimated Cost: $25-$30
The very biggest ripoff in Pinot Grigio. Hands down the worst $25 you will spend in the northern Italian wine category. This is the textbook example of mass produced, low quality wine. You are basically paying for them to open more wine bars in airports and train stations and not for a decent wine in the glass. Insipid, flavorless, and watery.
Try Terlan Pinot Grigio instead at $20. Bright, medium bodied, fruity, refreshing and clean finishing.
3. Veuve Cliquot Yellow Label Brut Champagne NV Estimate Cost: $65
I wish they put as much money into the production of this formerly solid wine as they do all those branded promotional items like coozies, tote bags, umbrellas, tee shirts, car seats, condoms, colostomy bags, etc.
Want to impress someone when you bring a bottle to a dinner party, and aren’t sure the host will understand/appreciate a grower Champagne?
Try Delamotte. The second label of Salon (You know, the very finest Champagne producer in existence.) is a bargain. I could bore you with the geeky details about the Clos de Mesnil area, and how it is the most ideal place to grow Chardonnay in the world, but I have probably lost you already. Bottom line: At a mere $50 it makes VC taste like comparative battery acid.
This one was tricky because Cloudy Bay is legitimately tasty. The issue here is VALUE. Do I like it enough to pay $30?
Not when I can buy a similarly good wine like Massey Dacta for $12 ! It shows all the markers of a solid New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc: Grapefruit, vegetal notes, a tart mid palate, and SUPER clean finish.
Angelo Gaja put Barbaresco on the map with his innovative techniques of winemaking and marketing in the 70’s and 80’s. He very quickly became the darling of critics, then inevitably the collectors. The prices then SKYROCKETED.
I am using one of his higher end wines as an example of Veuve-Cliquot-itis.
Open a bottle of 2015 Produttori del Barbaresco Paje Riserva at $70 (so as to have a fair comparison) and taste them side by side.
The Produttori version of Barbaresco shows just as much elegance, nuance, and length as the Gaja, with better integrated tannins, in my humble professional opinion.
Salute!