Your favourite cheap wine - under €3

We like Oltesse Madiran 2011 which is sold in our local Inter and once a year, in about September, they sell it in cartons for "buy one, get one free". At that, it's usually about 22 euros per dozen. We buy a couple of hundred!

Can't beat Aldi Fitou!

A while back I had some Pencharmant, which is a nice blend of Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Malbec and Merlot Noir from a local wine cellar for €2 the bottle, plus red Prieure De Carenac Bergerac at €2.48 the bottle and a couple of bottles of Saussignac for €2.50 each. They were all local wine stock clearances, but good. Ironically, I probably drink a single glass of wine a month on average. Tonight though, I bought half a kilo of good Stilton on Thursday, I shall have a glass of the Pencharmant which has the body to go with my cheese.

there are some good local Gaillacs for around the 3€ mark

This is from Leclerc, under 3 euros. Pleasantly fruity not too light!

Can’t beat some of the Spanish wines. I always think they’re similar to Californian, well some of them.

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Agree, this is one of our favourites, also Roche Mazet Merlot.

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Cuvée de l’Hotel at Super-U is €1.39 and surprisingly quaffable.
Le Pas de la Mule is €2.24 (although Super-U did have some in at €1.10 a couple of years ago).

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Roche Mazet Merlot in Super U today. 3 ltr boxes just over €6 each…Nice!

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Unfortunately, in les Charentes there is only vin des pays, no AOCs, so I depend on Lidl and discovered a favourite of mine, which I discovered in Eire in 1993: Montepulciano d’Abruzzo. It is a very nice wine and sells for 1.99. I’m in Eire at the moment ((back to la France profonde on 1 Oct) and the same wine here in Lidl is 5.59 a bottle!! For general plonk, we use the cartons of Spanish vino tinto from Lidl at 1.99 for 1 I/2 litre. The same stuff in bottles in Eire is 3.99. Duty on wine here is horrendous. Oddly enough, in the mid 90s, lidl sold Charentais vin des pays: I 1/2 litre bottles. The Irish tend to drink a lot of US, Aussie and Chilean wines, so French and italian choices are limited. The cheapest wines in the other mainstream stores are rarely under 7.99 for very average non french plonk. I recommend the Montepulciano, which was once voted wine of the month by M&S in the 90s.

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That’s my favorite everyday “drinking” wine.
For showing off to guests, I leave the choice to my wife who is more knowledgeable in these matters.
But a great icebreaker with English visitors is an amusing little Fitou from the Chateau du Seigneur d’Arse - https://www.1001degustations.com/vin-137-chateau-du-seigneur-d-arse.html

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