Cheap wines that are SCARY cheap but super surprising
The Woodleaf Ranch Russian River Chardonnay 2020 is a $9.99 Aldi exclusive. I checked the California wine labeling website COLA and it showed that Rack and Riddle cellared and bottled this Chardonnay. Cellared and bottled means just that, they aged the wine for a certain amount of time and bottled it, but the named producer…
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The Trader Joe’s Grower’s Reserve Organic California Chardonnay 2022 is a $5.99 Trader Joe’s exclusive. It is produced for Trader Joe’s, or at least “vinted and bottled by”, ASV Wines. ASV Wines is a family-owned winery in business since 1981 and they own 1,500 acres of vineyards. Vinted and bottled by does not indicate that…
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The 3 Rein Never Tame Red Blend 2020 is a $7.99 Aldi exclusive. It was produced for Aldi by Precept Wines the largest privately owned wine company in the Northwest and it uses grapes farmed in the Columbia Valley AVA of Washington. That is the extent of what we know about this wine. The back…
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The Tuatea Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc 2022 is a $6.99 Trader Joe’s wine. This wine is imported to the US by WX Imports. It seems this wine sells in places where there is no Trader Joe’s for $13.99. CWF reviewed the 2017 vintage Tuatea and the Fearless Flyer back then mentioned his wine had some oak…
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The Don’t Mind If I Do Red Blend 2021 is a $7.99 Aldi sort of exclusive. It is a wine that has zero sugar, 85 calories, is gluten-free, and has only 9% alcohol content. It is made for Aldi by Scheid Vineyards and family-owned operation located on the Monterey AVA. The reason I say that…
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The Peaks And Tides Sonoma Coast Chardonnay 2021 is a $9.99 Aldi exclusive. The Peaks and Tides name is owned by Aldi, but the back label says it was vinted and bottled by a wine company in Geyserville, California. A quick check of the web showed this wine is credited to Delicato Family Vineyards who…
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The Domaine Condorcet Chateauneuf du Pape 2021 was found at Aldi for $9.99, it originally sold for $24.99 which was Aldi’s most expensive wine. A Chateauneuf-du-Pape wine is a Red blend from the southern Rhone Valley in France. It translates to the Pope’s new Chateau or in the 1300s, Castle. The Pope did not always…
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The Motif Red Hills Cabernet Sauvignon 2020 is a Trader Joe’s $4.99 exclusive. The Red Hills AVA is located inside the Lake County AVA which is north of Napa Valley and east of Mendocino. Clear Lake is the largest lake in California and it is situated in Lake County. The Red Hills AVA is on…
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The Gearbox Pinot Noir 2020 is $5.99 at Trader Joe’s. This is a wine that had retailed for an average of $15 at wine retailers, though it seems that there has been a recent price reduction occurring. So this may be a wine close-out. The Gearbox Pinot Noir 2020 is produced by Precision Wine Company,…
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The Kirkland K Vine Rosé 2022 is a $9.99 Costco exclusive produced for them by Charles Smith of K Vintners of Walla Walla, Washington. K Vine is a label created for their Costco wines, there is currently a Chardonnay, a Rose, with a Cabernet Sauvignon soon to come. The Kirkland K Vine Rosé 2022 is…
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The Trader Joe’s Reserve Columbia Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2017 is a $9.99 Trader Joe’s exclusive. The Trader Joe’s Fearless Flyer says this wine would sell for around $25 at a retail wine shop. A quick web check showed a 2017 vintage Cabernet Sauvignon selling in 2023 for a range of $20 to $70. Most wines,…
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The Trader Joe’s Reserve Syrah Wahluke Slope Organic 2021 is a $9.99 Trader Joe’s exclusive. This wine is 96% organic Syrah and 4% Merlot. For some reason, they do not label the Merlot grapes as organic. The wine was certified organic by California Certified Organic Farmers. The USDA requires 100% of the grapes to be…
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The Vin De Bordeaux B by Fonbadet Bordeaux 2019 sells for $7.99 at Trader Joe’s though it is widely available elsewhere, we will get to that later. It is a blend of 40% Cabernet Franc, 30% Cabernet Sauvignon, and 30% Merlot. It is sourced from a Chateau Fonbadet vineyard that was surrounded by First Growth…
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The Trader Joe’s Petit Reserve Paso Robles Chardonnay 2021 Is a $7.99 limited exclusive wine. Usually, Trader Joe’s wine has no production notes, but this wine is featured in the Fearless Flyer so we have a few things to go on. To make a short story even shorter, Trader Joe’s says that a wine partner…
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The High Guard Chardonnay 2021 Trader Joe’s is a $6.99 Trader Joe’s exclusive. It is produced for them by a family-owned winery located in Napa Valley, though the grapes are from California. A wine produced from grapes grown in California must show California as the place of origin f the grapes are not from one…
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The Quarter Cut Bourbon Barrel Malbec 2020 Aldi is a $5 Aldi wine imported from Argentina. The $5 price tag may be unique to my local Aldi, the wine seems to normally sell for $7 or $8. Wine from Argentina typically will show a vineyard location even if it is as general as the Mendoza…
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The Paton Clemente Tempranillo Crianza 2019 is a $4.99 Trader Joe’s import exclusive, sourced from vineyards in the La Mancha D.O. of central Spain. LaMancha is the largest wine-producing region in Spain and one of the largest in the world. Crianza is a Spanish wine designation, these wines must have two years of age with…
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The Purple Moon Chardonnay 2020 Trader Joe’s is a $3.99 Trader Joe’s exclusive. This wine is one of TJ’s perennial wines we first reviewed the 2011 vintage, it was $3.99 9 years ago. How they keep the price the same after all these years is a small miracle. This wine along with other wines in…
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The Kirkland Bordeaux Superieur 2020 is a $6.99 Costco exclusive, a blend of 60% Cabernet Sauvignon and 40% Merlot. The Superieur designation is a step up from plain Bordeaux wines, the best Bordeaux wines are from specific locations such as Medoc or Pomerol. Over half of the wines from Bordeaux sell for under $25. The…
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The Kirkland Russian River Pinot Noir 2021 is an $11.99 Costco reclusive made for them by winemaker Nancy Walker. Nancy has over 20 years of experience and is one of the winemakers for Vintage Wine Estates. Trader Joe’s and Aldi never offer information on who made their wines, I have fun figuring out who made…
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Trader Joe’s French Blanc de Blanc and Brut Rosé both Trader Joe’s exclusive $6.99 import Sparkling wines. The Fearless Flyer indicates that these are proprietary blends from the South of France near the Mediterranean Sea. These French Sparkling wines probably do not include Chardonnay or Pinot Noir the mainstays of Champagne Sparkling wines. It is…
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The Trader Joe’s Reserve Santa Barbara Syrah 2021 is a Trader Joe’s $9.99 exclusive. This Syrah is produced by the Miller Family Wine Company they are a fifth-generation wine company that owns 1,500 acres of vineyards in Paso Robles. They are also part of Thornhill Companies which own the acclaimed Bien Nacido and French Camp…
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The Dancing Flame Gran Reserva Sauvignon Blanc 2021 is a $7.99 Aldi wine made for them by Vina Luis Felipe Edwards the largest family-owned winery in Chile. The grapes are sourced from vineyards in the Leyda Valley, situated between the Andes Mountains and the Pacific Ocean. The Leyda Valley vineyards are located between 3,300 ft…
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The Mionetto Prosecco Treviso Brut is a Sparkling wine from a winery founded in 1887 in the Valdobbiadene region of Veneto which is now located inside the Prosecco DOC region of northern Italy. The winery changed to the Charmat Method in 1982. The Charmat Method is by far the main production technique used in Prosecco….
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The Big Churn Chardonnay 2021 is $6.99 at Trader Joe’s. I do not think it is a Trader Joe’s exclusive it looks like it is available at internet wine sellers for between $8 and $12. This Chardonnay is produced by Fior di Sole, a family-owned winery headquartered in Napa. They are the 10th largest winery…
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