Ménage a trois California Red Wine 2011

This! Okay move over Two Buck Chuck! This is the best cheap wine you will have today! Granted, it is more like $7 or $8, and the more savvy could probably seek it out for $6, nonetheless it is worth twice what you paid. I would be surprised to find a wine that is cheaper and better.

If you haven't found this yet, come out from under your rock, Hilda, and embrace the dark purple sunshine!

This is not the most amazing wine you will ever taste, or drink. But it is a solid addition to any cellar, great for cooking and getting blasted with a friend (actually I don't recommend getting blasted on wine--that is for ugly girls. If you insist on getting wasted on alcohol, do it the proper way: with liquor).

You should always have a couple bottles of cheap drinking wine after the tasting is over and you feel like keeping a buzz going to fuel a great conversation. (I know I have mentioned this before, but I'm mentioning it again--cause this shit is, like, important).

I don't want to misrepresent myself: I have no problem drinking alone. It's just not as fun. I much prefer company. Because if I am drinking alone, my wine is probably being seasoned by bitter tears of salty defeat, or salty regret, or salty self-pity. Not always: sometimes I will have a wine and cheese party for one while watching an old black and white movie--cause ya gotta.

But most often, wine is a social thing. Have it with a friend, it tastes better.

So yes, Folie a Deux. One moment I'm lambasting you, comparing you to your prettier older sister, Napa Cellars, but this is one thing Napa Cellars can't do: be this good for this cheap. It's a blend of Trois wines. You can find it at Costco. It has a sweetness to it, a smoothness, and bizarrely, a sophisticated structure that something this cheap should not have. It should fall apart on your tongue, dissolving into goo like old gum, but like your best suspenders, it holds up.

Bottom line: Two steps: 1. Buy a case. 2. Drink said case.