I occasionally drink wine and what I've learned about cooking with it is that you'll never use the whole bottle, so buy something you'll drink with whatever you're cooking. Cooking wine tastes awful. Drinking wine works with cooking and it tastes good!

I use the little bottles or little boxed wine. Often they are on sale 2 for 8.00. If there is any leftover from a bottle, then I make ice cubes and freeze them in a ziplock bag for the next time I need a small amount of wine for a recipe. Only for pork ragu do I go out and buy a nice bottle of Cab because we will have that with dinner.

I drink wine, but still keep a bottle of dry vermouth and dry sherry in the liquor cabinet. The sherry is used in Asian dishes calling for wine and the vermouth in most others calling for white. If I need a red wine I'll buy a pack of the small bottles.

ditto what CindyMac said re Vermouth and dry Sherry but honestly, Im not sure it enhances the taste of the dish, at least not in a way that would make me say "wow, I really miss the wine". I too buy the cheapy $1 little bottles but if they taste awful to drink, how could they enhance a dish? I've been skipping the wine lately.

There are a lot of $5 bottles that are better than anything I have found in those little 4 packs.
Look for Australian or Chilean reds....Yellow tail is about $5 here and more than OK for a Cabernet or a merlot.
And the whites, I like a Sauvignon blanc or even a pinot grigio....again australian for the best for cheap.
I don't use vermouth unless something calls for specifically vermouth. It gives a very different flavor than an un fortified and un "herbed" white.
I use a lot of sherrry in cooking....often adding a cup to a pot of chicken soup and 1/4 cup to a small pot of cream of mushroom or shrimp. But sherry does not do the same thing as a dry white.
And what is beef stew without almost a whole bottle of a heavy red? And a pot roast? half a bottle to 4 pounds of chuck.....simmer and reduce the sauce....yum!
Have half a bottle of wine left? Slice some onions, add a knob of butter to a frypan and add the onions and simmer and reduce....and freeze for a quick enhancement to something like a quick Salsbury steak or slices of a re warmed leftover roast.

Linda, Yellowtail is available in the 4 packs

I find vermouth can be seamlessly substituted for white wine in just about any savory recipe.

I also do not like vermouth, but that's my personal taste. I do find that most Sauvignon Blanc wines are good, even when inexpensive, and I agree with Linda that Pingot Grigio is another good choice. While I also like Chardonnay, I generally do not like the cheap ones, and the taste of Chardonnay is all over the map and can be unpredictable if you are unfamiliar with the brand.

For reds, I generally cook with Chianti, and you can find good bottles for just under $10. I buy ones that are labeled "Riserva", but this term is meaningless outside of Italy or Spain. I also buy Pinot Noir, which I prefer over Cabernet, but then I do not cook with beef or pork, and I mostly drink the Pinot Noir, although I have added small amounts to pasta sauce.

I also like Linda's idea of making a sauce with leftover wine and freezing that instead of just freezing the wine.

I agree that you are better off buying an inexpensive large bottle or half bottle versus the choices in small bottles. I like to buy decent value bottles, use them in a recipe, and then finish them off.

I'll try to name some widely distributed national lines.

A good alternative for value white is Bogle sauvignon blanc and chardonnay. They are consistently rated among the top value wines under $10. Their reds are OK as are the blends from Folie A Deux.

As mentioned, the Chilean and Argentinean reds (including Malbecs) are good alternatives: Norton, Montes Alpha and Concha Y Toro.

I find Yellowtail to be a bit jammy. I find other Australian reds to be more appealing, especially the Shiraz or blends like Henry's Pillar Box Red. New Zealand sauv blancs from the Marlborough region, like Kim Crawford, are reliable.

Another source for reds are Sicilian nero d'avolas -- in groceries stores, Planeta probably has the biggest distribution but has gotten pricey. For chianti, Banfi is usually reliable and can be found under $10.

General rule of thumb when cooking with wine is only use something you'd drink. When the water steams out, you're left with a concentration of the flavors of the wine, so they'd best be good. I've heard that boxed wines have improved greatly since they first came out and were pure rotgut. In theory, that could be a good way to go because the packaging might help keep them from oxidizing.

The best way to find better wines for cooking with is to keep an eye out for sales. This won't help for most of a year, but if you go to the big chain groceries (if they sell wine in your area) in the Jewish neighborhoods, you can usually get great deals on wine in March, before Passover. Also look for deals on mixed 6. If they're trying to clear inventory, they'll sometimes do a deal like any 6 bottles for 30% off across the board. Just put the wine in a cool, dark place, where the temperature doesn't fluctuate a lot and it'll keep. You can get a year's worth at once.

Another way to go is to look for loss leaders. Advertised price is below break even to get you to think about buying wine altogether. Stick to the ones on special.

If you really don't use much, and you have friends who drink good wine and are really into it, you can also get some wine for free, or maybe in exchange for a homemade dessert. Ask if they have some ends of bottles. We don't drink up the ends in time and I always have more than enough for a splish of this and a splash of that in the cooking. I'm sure there are many others who have a few ends to spare. Just be mindful of your location's open container transport laws. Generally, if it's corked (or wrapped in foil and rubber bands), and in the trunk, or storage area of a wagon/suv, it's fine, but some places you're just not allowed, period.

I drink Chardonnay, but never cook with it because it turns bitter

Chardonnay bitter?? Obviously you have only tried oaked Chards.
Gooster, I agree, Bogle is a great all around table wine....but here it's more like $12 to $15 a bottle....the state takes a chunk of sales and determines what brands we can buy. And the liquor commission says we can't have little bottles of yellow tail.
I will use a splash of vermouth in say a sauteed chicken and mushroom dish....but never ever in something that calls for a lot of dry white wine like Risotto

@lindac92 --- ugh, Bogle at $12 to $15 a bottle? It's a $7 to $8 wine around here. Even less if you go their winery deep in the Delta. I use vermouth as well from time to time, but only in dishes that can stand up to the extra herbs/spices, like a splash in a simple tomato sauce/deglaze. Yeah, risotto would be a disaster with a bad wine or too much vermouth.

That's right Linda. I like an oaked Chardonnay. Haven't made risotto in years, but I'd agree Vermouth wouldn't be a good fit there.

Here Bogle is $7 at Costco and $8-9 elsewhere.

Good old Iowa liquor board.....

I buy Bogle Cabernet, but that's because it is one of the few inexpensive Cabernet wines that I like - the others being from Trader Joe's, and you said that was not an option for you. Still, since I prefer a milder red, I generally cook with Pinot Noir or Chianti. I buy most of my wine from Bristol Farms, and they have a sommelier on staff to help. If your store has one of those, they can help you make a good selection, even if you are only buying it for cooking. Otherwise, try going to a beverage warehouse, such as Bevmo.

I sometimes buy on-line from stores like Green Jug Fine Wine and Spirits, which I did when I received a bottle of wine as a gift that I especially liked but could not find in stores, but I don't think they have anything under $10. I do not want to drive to Woodland Hills (about an hour away in normal traffic; 35 minutes if no traffic) for wine, but I will order from them - the shipping is less than the aggravation of going through the dreaded Sepulveda Pass - going and coming. I often go to Beverage Warehouse in Marina Del Rey, which is just 10 minutes from me, as it is closer than Bevmo in El Segundo, but Green Jug has a better selection. Maybe I will make the trek to Green Jug one of these days. If you go to a specialty beverage store, you will get more help, and it can be fun.

I like dry sherry for cooking - NOT cooking sherry (which contains 'seasoning?). Unlike regular wine, it keeps indefinitely.

I like dry sherry for cooking too....but only for certain things. Doesn't do the job in beef dishes nor do I like it in a rissotto of a chicken picatta.

Specifically for general cooking, I have Madeira, Port, Marsala and sweet Sherry. They're in the cabinet by the stove. They're particular flavors, however, and stronger than just wine. They mostly get used by the splash (tablespoon to quarter cupful) rather than by the bottle. I do have a recipe or two that call for dry sherry, but I have to get that out of the liquor cabinet. ;) The Vermouth is too tall a bottle, so is in the pantry, but it's also very useful--the only use I have for it is in cooking. :)

Even when it isn't oaked, I'm careful where I use a lot of Chardonnay because it's also a strong flavor. Some dishes can take it, some can't. Same for Cabernets. They're great with roasted red meats, but can be too assertive in general, even by the spoonful.

Varietals that are light, cheap and good for cooking include Chablis and Riesling, if you want it more for the alcohol than flavor. For something a bit more vegetative and acidic, Sauvignon Blanc is good. Reds are more difficult because the cheap ones are worse. I use the ends of table Merlot and Pinot Noir, in general, rather than buying bottles of red for the pot, and I'll use old vine wine ends (Granacha, et al.) judiciously for a richer flavor. When I want a splash of sweet or heavy flavor, I use Madeira or Port.

The tricky part is for a reduction. I spend a hefty chunk more for that than I usually do for the table because when you reduce it, you concentrate the flaws as well as the highlights. I don't have a single go to for that, and will choose depending on what's on sale and will go with my dish.

One thing to keep in mind when you're cooking with wine is that while the flavor of alcohol cooks off fairly quickly, the alcohol content does not. In most cooking styles and times, it will mostly remain.

Unless you are adding alcohol in the last minutes of cooking, a large amount of the alcohol does cook out. See the table in this link:
http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2011/11/alcohol-doesnt-really-cook-out-of-food-in-most-cases/

To save you a read, what it says is that when alcohol is added to a dish after it's removed from the heat, around 85% of the alcohol remains, however the alcohol added to a dish that is cooked for 2 1/2 hours and stirred, is 5%.
Simple common sense will tell you that due to the increased volatility and lower boiling point of alcohol, a lot of it does cook out of a dish

Well, it's a matter of outlook, I guess, Linda, on how long you expect to cook something and where the line for "a lot" is. Your link is titled "Alcohol doesn't really cook out of food in most cases," after all. The people I know who care are mostly Mormons and Alcoholics, so a 35% reduction of alcohol after 30 minutes of cooking is still a lot of alcohol for them. Here is the source I'm more familiar with--same numbers, but a few more divisions and in table form.

The tables are the same in your link as in mine.
Let's say you have a stew and you add 1/4 cup of a red wine to it. Given that a red wine contains an average of 12% alcohol the amount of alcohol in 1/4 cup is a little less than 1/2 an ounce...less than 1 1/2 teaspoons full. So if you cook that for 30 minutes....only 35% is retained according to your chart....so after 30 minutes of cooking less than 1/2 a teaspoon of alcohol is in the whole dish....divided in say 4 servings.....the amount is very very tiny...inconsequential. And if you cook that stew for an hour.... as most people do....you have even less.
Alcoholics I know and I know way more than my share, are not concerned about the wine in the stew nor the vanilla in the cake, but more the vodka in the bottle and the Nyquil and the Vicks, etc....all of which contain more alcohol that a serving of stew cooked with wine.

If Vermouth was good enough for Julia Child it's good enough for me. We always have a bottle in the fridge -- we're martini drinkers. Another cheaper red is Crane Lake. If you go to a real liquor store, they should be able to help you with a good red to keep on hand. The trouble is that there are about 5 cups in a bottle and if you use only one, two weeks later it's not very good. Someone said that they froze the rest of the wine in ice cube trays to use in recipes. I've not done that so don't know if it works.

Linda, yes, I said that they were the same numbers and offered the link as easier to read in table form. Alcoholics I've spoken to don't want the slightest trace of alcohol in the food, and I'm the last one to tell them what they should or shouldn't have to maintain their sobriety. You're right about stew, however. I was thinking more about sautés and other quicker cooking things, where one might have half a cup of wine per portion or two, going for less than half an hour.

Re what Martha said, it's true that the red wines will oxidize after awhile. Especially if kept on the counter near the stove. If it's decent wine, I'll use a vacuum stopper even if it's just going in the cooking. You have more than two weeks in a not too hot kitchen between when a wine is best for drinking and when it's no longer fine for cooking, even if it's just corked, however, and whites last even longer.

I don't use a wine even for cooking after it has been opened for 4 or 5 days.....certainly not for drinking.
My mother was an alcoholic and my best girl-friend...and other family and friends as well> I don't know any who worry about the residual wine in a stew, they are much more worried about despair and depression leading to the desire to consume.

We have a pretty extensive wine cellar. Not intentional but we are both bosses and are given bottles of this and that for gifts all year long...never cheap stuff. Not big drinkers but maybe once a month. And never finish a bottle so i freeze it. In 1/2 pint containers and use for stews(red) and fish chowders (white). Always having a few 1/2 pints frozen i can have that flavor needed.

During holiday like this past month we stock good box wine, red and white. With so many guests stopping by we can offer a glass of either red or white and the boxes will last a few weeks and we can also use for cooking. Designed to not allow the dreaded air that oxidizes wine. Three weeks is a good limit for the boxes.

For a recommended red or white for cooking try a Chilean or an Australian. When scratching your head in a wine isle, do let anyone offering help know that you are looking for a cooking wine that is also a good glass for a sip. You want a red that is rich and full flavored, not sweet, and a white that is rich full flavored like a chardonnay, not thin and sweet. Wine seller are not often cooks. So the thought of cooking wine might toss them off but will understand you are not being 'cheap'...just looking for a multi-purpose quality wine. Easy in the 8-12 dollar range.

And don't hesitate to freeze the rest for later....

Linda, I believe you about your family. Believe me about my friends who ask that I don't use any alcohol in the food I cook for them.

I used to do the same thing with opened wine, until I learned that it doesn't really make a difference if you're cooking it. In fact, the most spectacular lamb braise I ever made was with a very fine, very expensive wine that a friend had poorly stored and which had started to go off--not vinegary or anything, but thoroughly oxidized, perhaps from the cork loosening or something. It was too much of a shame to chuck it, so I tried it on the lamb, and it was spectacular. If I have a wine sitting around, I'll taste a sip of it just to be sure, before I use it. So far, I haven't found one that was too far gone to heat up in the cooking. :)

I would go with a regular sized bottle. What you do not use, put in a jar and freeze it. It does not freeze completely so when you need a bit, you can spoon some out for your gravy, pan sauce, or whatever. This is also what I do with the leftovers from a wine that has not been fully drunk. I keep one jar for reds and one jar for whites. For most dishes, it does not matter if there is a bit of a mix (Chianti and Cab and... or Pinot Grigio and Sauv Blanc...).