Red Wine for cooking - what brand should I get?

I want to start cooking using red wine, but I don't know anything about wine or brands. What's a good brand of wine to use that would yield restaraunt quality cooking? Since I don't drink wine, this is for cooking purposes only.|||When I use red wine for cooking I use inexpensive wine (less than $10, usually around $6) which is not so sour nor tannic but dark in color (but not as dark as traditional Bordeaux). It is because sourness and tannin get concentrated during the cooking process and if the wine is too light-colored, it is a bit difficult to make a good color. For me, cheap zinfandel works well. Zinfandel, in general, is not sour, not tannic and has a body.





I also often use "Carlo Rossi's Californian Red and White" for cooking. This is not zinfandel..





When you cook stewed dish like boeuf Bourguignon, the type of wine gets more important, and some purists claim that one should use nice Burgundian pinot noir for this, but I don't really care. Pinot noir has a very nice sourness. It certainly contribute to the dish, but this kind of wine is rather expensive and I rather drink it.





Just stay out of tannic wine. If you use inexpensive wine from New World regions (like California, Chile), it will most likely work well. In my opinion, cooking techniques, seasoning and the combination of ingredients are far more important than choosing right wine as long as, again, you stay out of tannic wine.





As for wine to drink, there are two ways to pair wine and food. One is to choose something with similar characters. If your dish is heavy, you drink full-bodied wine, and so on. The other method is to serve wine with an opposite character in order to achieve a complementary effect. For example, sauvignon blanc with cream-based sauce. The crispness of sauvignon blanc cuts through the richness of cream.





In a decent restaurant, waiters tell the chef which wine customers are drinking so that the chef can make a little adjustment on the dish to serve. Even in those restaurants, they often use inexpensive wine to cook. They may use expensive cognac for a final touch, though...|||I use Inglenook both to cook with %26amp; as table wine. I also use a lot of Sherry in my cooking. Brand name doesn't matter as long as it says "dry Sherry" Don't get frustrated with non brand answers. Wines are regional and may very well not be available in all areas. Judge more by price- a good wine can be had for $8-$10. All the wine snobs are going to berate me but I've been to numerous wine tastings where a medium priced wine outshone the high end stuff. Its tough to cook with wine if you don't taste it, because the old adage of "if you wouldn't drink it, don't cook with it" is very true.|||A mid-priced cabernet sauvignon or merlot would work well for most dishes calling for red wine. An Italian dish might work well with Chianti. If in doubt, ask someone at the wine store. They usually have some advice for wines that are popular for cooking. I really like California red wines, they are affordable and are both good for cooking and equally good for serving to your guests that may like a glass of wine with a meal.





Never waste your money on the 'cooking wine' (non alchoholic) sold in the grocery stores. They are salty and awful.|||Go For Sutter Home or Turning Leaf. They are decent wines that are also inexpensive. As the quality of wine goes down, (think box wines) so does the taste and the overall quality of the dish. However, don't spend too much money on a wine as some of the flavor is destroyed during cooking.|||They always say only use wine that you would drink So use the wine you would serve your guests.