I am looking to start a small wine collection to complement my new
interest in wine tasting. Potential storage area is 57 degrees(f) and
45 percent humidity.
Looking for suggestions on wines to buy (reds, any variety) in the
15-30 dollar range.

Thanks in advance.

Trout
Providence, RI

I am looking to start a small wine collection to complement my new
interest in wine tasting. Potential storage area is 57 degrees(f) and
45 percent humidity.
Looking for suggestions on wines to buy (reds, any variety) in the
15-30 dollar range.

Thanks in advance.

Trout
Providence, RI

Hi Trout,

Good call on storage. Too many people starting out miss this one key factor.

As for suggestions, my first suggestion would be to assemble a case of assorted
wines and give them all a try to see what you think.

It will be many more cases before you have a real clear vision of exactly what
you want from wine, but this is a good starting point before you begin to
cellar wines.

Here is a short list of some things I recommend you seek out. A couple are a
bit over $30, but should be under $40. Some are also under $10, but make great
intros to certain wine types (and are pretty good in their own right.)

White burgundy

Louis Latour Grande Ardeche
Joseph Drouhin Pouilly Fuisse
Ramonet Bourgogne Aligote (hard to find, but worth the effort)

Red Burgundy

Claude Dugat Bourgogne- 2001 is current release, be wary of the 2000
Bertrand Ambroise Bourgogne (the 2001 is outstanding and a good one to cellar a
bit, $15!)

Gascony

Domaine de Pouy

Bordeaux (as a general rule the 1999s are very friendly and forward wines, high
quality too and overlooked with all the 2000 vintage hype)

Chateau Meyney 1999
Chateau Talbot 1999
Chateau Montrose 1999
Blanc de Lynch Bages
Climens (sweet Bordeaux dessert wine, seek out half bottles of 1996-1999)
Rieussec 1999 (another great Bordeaux dessert wine, top QPR here)

Alsace, France

Trimbach Riesling, Tokay Pinot Gris or Gewurztraminer (3 good intros to Alsace
wines)
Zind-Humbrecht- a wide range of wines in your range, all worth sampling

Germany

Muller-Catoir (anything they make)
Kurt Darting (anything they make)

Italy

Gaja Promis 2001 (I had this at a trade tasting and it is one of their best
ever, stunning!!!!)
Allegrini Pallazo della Torre

That is a small smattering of goodies covering Europe. I am not terribly up to
date with the latest and greatest from the US (I was ITB in college and got a
lot of free trade samples), so hopefully someone else will come along with some
thoughts there.

Take care,

Tom.

Trout_RI wrote:
I am looking to start a small wine collection to complement my new
interest in wine tasting. Potential storage area is 57 degrees(f) and
45 percent humidity.
Looking for suggestions on wines to buy (reds, any variety) in the
15-30 dollar range.

Here in NYC Astor W&S has a "Cellar-In-A-Box" mixed case that tries to
cover as much terr....itory (resisting the urge to pun) as possible in a
case. You might try asking your local shops if they do something like
that. Astor's approach doesn't stick in the same price range, they try
to balance some cheapies against higher priced stuff for special
occasions. Now that I think about it, no reason you couldn't use their
list as a starting point and substitute where you'd see fit:

http://www.astoruncorked.com/cellar-in-a-box.cfm

-- kov