It doesn't happen very often

But sometimes it does. Occasionally, you will get a bad wine. Not an unluckily bad bottle; a bad wine. Sheer, unadulterated crud. Remember Bohemian Highway? These are like that.



Finca Vieja tempranillo (from Spain) looking and tasting like purple Kool-aid, complete with the sugary afterburn in the throat. Retail, about $5. Big, industrial-farming-practices companies like Barefoot and Beringer and Sutter Home can deliver decent wine at that price point; smaller companies, I daresay, cannot possibly.

And Timberwood merlot (California): a washed-out brick color. Smelled like bad breath. The punishment of tasting seemed unnecessary. Retail, about $10.

Both make the wine drinker grateful that indeed, this level of achievement is unusual. A wholesale representative who comes to the wine aisle all the time says that when people ask him to recommend a good wine, he simply laughs and says, "Pick one." He's right. And well-known wine writers agree with him that now is the best and tastiest of times for the average wine drinker on an average budget. The big companies competing for your business are all, for the most part, turning out lakefuls good, fresh, sound product. Is it all a tad uniform? Perhaps. But for $5 or $7 or $10, yes -- relax, and pick one.

Just please don't pick either of these.