Red Wines For A Budget Tasting: Classic Regions, With A Twist

Burgundy. Portugal. Austria.

Those three historic wine-producing regions don’t necessarily jump to mind when choosing value-priced wines. But for this final installment of our mini-series on how to organize a group wine tasting for ten dollars per person, those three historic regions are exactly where we turn. Certainly, each region produces premium-priced, better-known wines, such as the luxurious Port wines from the Douro region of northern Portugal to the iconic Grand Cru wines of Burgundy’s Côte de Nuits to the most significant and restaurant-favorite Grüner Veltliner wines from Austria.

Though the regions are best known for those premium-priced options, we’re turning to the “close neighbors” of those options for the purposes of our ten-dollars-per-person tasting. Not a Port wine from the Douro, for instance, but a still red wine. Not a Grand Cru wine from Burgundy but a Passetoutgrain instead. And not the more popular white wines from Austria but a Blaufränkish red.

Here are some suggestions, and specific details about the stories to tell.

2017 Quinta do Crasto, Douro, Portugal

Portuguese red wines have increased their popularity recently, particularly on restaurant wine lists, and for good reason. Historically, the Douro is the oldest demarcated wine region in the world, and the home of the iconic after-dinner Port wines. Yet the grapes that comprise those fortified wine blends are the same grapes that comprise intense, characterful wines that are also blends, but at lower (not fortified) levels of alcohol.

The Quinta do Crasto, for example, at $14 per bottle, is a blend of varieties local to the Douro including Tinta Roriz, Touriga Franca, Touriga Nacional and Tinta Barroca.

2020 Jean-Luc Joillot, Passetoutgrain, Burgundy, France

Looking for the pedigree of red Burgundy, the approachability of Beaujolais, at a price point that can suit a group tasting for ten dollars a person?

It sounds nearly impossible yet the solution — a blend of Pinot Noir and Gamay called Passetoutgrain — has been around for centuries. It’s just that we don’t see all that much of it outside of France. Passetoutgrain, by French law, is comprised of two-thirds Gamay (the red grape of Beaujolais) and one-third Pinot Noir (which is the only red grape allowed to be planted throughout the rest of Burgundy). Which makes Passetoutgrain the only red wine in Burgundy that is not 100 percent Pinot Noir.

It’s a neat exception to the rule, and a neat story to tell about Burgundy, for a mere $17 per bottle.

2017 Strehn Blaufränkish, Burgenland, Austria

Think “wine from Austria” and you’re likely to think “white wine” such as Riesling or Grüner Veltliner. But the red wines from Austria and, for me, Burgenland specifically offer some very compelling counterpoints. Blaufränkish is one of them, along with Zweigelt and Sankt Laurent.

The producer of this final wine in our line-up is named Weingut Strehn. They have been making wine, and red wines in particular, for 60 years. The winery is now owned by third-generation Monika Strehn. One of her sons is the winemaker, another the vineyard manager, and her daughter runs the operation. At $16 per bottle, it’s a taste of central Europe — deep and woody, structured yet velvety as they age.