A bottle of wine can be a good gift for a special occasion or a visit to your family or friends at a dinner party. However, if you are not familiar with this fantastic drink, picking one out can be challenging. It’s essential to think about the people, their tastes, and the event so that you could choose the right one. And if you know some basic information about wine, it can help you learn more about which wines are likely to be a good fit and which ones to avoid. Until now, we have had a positive experience picking the right wines for our family and friends. Below we will share with you our way of choosing a bottle of good wine for a gift
In vino veritas/ In wine, we trust
If you go to visit your friends, it is a sign of good manner to bring some things with you: flowers for the hostess, a bottle of wine and chocolates (the number of the gifts and the flowers have to be uneven. In Bulgaria, the even number of flowers is reserved for funerals, and it is a wrong choice in all the other cases). But, of course, it depends on how close your hosts are to you – you can bring beers, a cake, another present, another person, or nothing at all. But let’s be honest – everyone loves gifts, either to give or to receive ones. And it is always good to have more wine than less.
So! Do we all have a cupboard full of bottles of different alcohol, jars, waffles, popcorn, other food supplies? No? Why then? It is good to have such one! So go out there and buy one. You can keep money and gold bars in it or make your own little wine store. By doing so, you will be prepared for every occasion and will have the perfect alcohol match for every dish. You will also be ready for unexpected guests, lockdowns, and many other occasions.
How to choose a bottle of good wine for a present?
The best way might be to know the producer personally and to like his production. It will be a win-win situation: you are helping a friend buying his wine products, and you have a story to tell, a subject to start a conversation with. But, honestly, we still don’t know any wine producers. In that case, the second option (probably the most popular one) comes: You tasted this wine once, and it was so lovely you bought another bottle to make it more famous. Or friends of yours have tried one particular wine and recommended it to you. Or you read some good reviews about it and its several gold medals throughout the years.
How about recommendations from a seller in a wine shop, a producer during a wine festival, or a sommelier during dinner? The different charts also give sound advice about what you might buy.
Well, sometimes the recommended wines might be too expensive, or you try to avoid asking other people in person. You want to look confident. So do we. Then, a good option is to observe what other people buy. And we don’t mean those buyers, who look stressed in front of the wine shelves, and it seems like they will randomly pick up a wine bottle. Random picking is an excellent method for trying new things if you believe in luck. (There was a nice butcher store I used to visit. At some point, they started offering 2 or 3 types of wine and other meat-related stuff. One day I saw a client shopping for a family holiday – meat, some of the other stuff, and yeah, wine – about 10 or 12 bottles of the red one. So I decided to buy one of these too… Unfortunately, I can’t tell you how it was: back then I bought it as a present for my girlfriend’s parents. I totally have to ask them how it was.)
Wine bottles based on their covers
Do you choose books based on their covers? Of course, we know the sentence “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” And we totally can’t agree – the cover is an essential part of our final judgment. And we are not talking just about books. Let’s say it: In most cases, it doesn’t matter if someone’s soul and heart are the purest and the most beautiful ones! The inner beauty might stay hidden if you don’t like their outlook. If you don’t like someone’s cover, you might never get to know their character and thoughts. It doesn’t mean you have to like everyone you talk to, but it will be better not to dislike them. (We presume you don’t communicate a lot with people you dislike.) Yes, with time, our perspective and thoughts about someone can change. But why you should wait when you can just go and be where you like it with people you like, read books with lovely covers, drink wines with nice looking labels. Yep, we sometimes choose by the cover. (Ones I picked a book by its cover, and it turned to be one of my favorite Bulgarian books.) Picking wine by its label can also be part of your way to try new wines. But we don’t recommend this option when choosing a bottle for a present.
Wine bottles based on their price
How about choosing a wine based on its price? No matter why we buy a bottle of wine, we don’t want one day somebody to say, “And this cheap and bad tasty wine I got as a present from … (our name)!” At the same point, we don’t want to give our salary away for a wine, which we could not even taste. Nobody is obligated to open the wine someone brings as a present. And this is true for all the gifts.
By cooking, never use a wine you don’t want to drink! We all know this advice. It is another story if we agree and if we cook according to it. But this is another reason to buy a bottle of good wine. (I like cooking with wine. Sometimes I even use it in the dish.)
A cheese with a lower price than the milk is suspicious. The same rule is applicable for the wine price – nowadays, a bottle under 4-5 EUR is considered not the best quality. Yep, numerous homeless wine drinkers will disagree. As students, we all have tried the cheaper version of the drinks we wanted because we didn’t have the money for the expensive ones. Yes, the best taste and high quality of the wine might not be on the list of why we bought them back then. Once you have the money and start thinking a bit more about your health, the quality becomes more important. (Yesterday, I saw my favorite cheap white wine from the old times. Of course, I bought it! I was very enthusiastic until the first sip. Oh God, there were times I used to drink this wine. The street drinkers will get a free bottle of wine…)
Local wines – perfect gift when returning from a trip
In some cases, the company store of a wine producer can offer wines or special editions we can’t find in a regular store. There you can find excellent solutions for a present.
If you live in another region or have traveled somewhere lately, you can choose a wine from there. It will be a good conversation starter again, and your guests, hosts, or friends will have the opportunity to try something new. That’s the situation also when you have foreign guests – you can always bring a bottle or more of locally produced wine. Almost every region grows a specific sort of grape or is famous for a particular kind of alcohol. (Of course, this applies not only to alcoholic drinks but also to the magnificent world of food.)
You recently have visited Madeira Island? And you brought us this beautiful bottle of wine from there? How sweet, we have always wanted to try it, but we were not sure if the wine in our local shop would be the same as the original…
Or you are in Bulgaria, and you haven’t tried any of the local sorts of wines yet? Mavrud, Melnik 55, Rubin, Gymza – these are classic Bulgarian tastes you can find in every store. The Mavrud is a little bit heavy, but the Rubin has the highest amount of antioxidants, making it a healthy choice for a drink! If you are interested in Bulgarian wines and where you can find the best of them, read more in our article about the best Bulgarian wineries.
Oh, you were in Cuba last week? Is this rum from there? Which rum has the original Cuban taste? Is the Cuban rum better than the one with a different origin? Let’s taste – buy several bottles of different rums and invite friends for a tasting party. (Be prepared to make some colorful cocktails – Mojito, Daiquiri, Pina Colada, etc.) Don’t forget to invite us as well!
The tasting party can be great if you spend some time preparing for it and share your expectations with your friends. Because if everyone brings something and the people don’t have a shared list, you might have a tasting party with ten bottles of the same rum. It still might be a great rum and a great party too. However, the idea is to try different producers or different products of one producer. (A mindful association can be the list with wished presents for a wedding, where every guest can choose what to bring.)
So finally, our advice is to go out of your comfort zone and try new regions and different wines. Maybe the first steps on your wine journey will be challenging or discouraging, but you will find the beauty of the wine and enjoy the adventure with time.
What is the way you choose a bottle of wine for a gift? Share your thoughts about this magic drink in the comments below.
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