Rex Goliath Cabernet

I'm a big fan of red wine. I'm also a big fan of cheap. Those two things together can be a nasty headache but there are wine makers who are able to combine them to great affect. In recent years I've developed a slight wine snobbery and have eschewed the very cheap bottles that used to be my staples. I told myself that I'm older, wiser, and deserve better wine. I recently started wonder, though, if those cheap wines were actually any good or if I had deluded myself. I decided to try them again.

My first stop was Rex Goliath Cabernet Sauvignon. This wine features the picture and story of a 47 pound rooster that used to be part of a Texas circus. The wine doesn't have a vintage, which is highly suspicious. The website doesn't offer any explanation, either. It is to be accepted that they make wine, you know next to nothing about it, and you will drink it. My snobby-sense was tingling. I took a few sips of the wine and found a very immature but still quite pleasant experience. It was very jammy and bright. It had a vibrancy that helped me perk up at the end of a long day. I kept looking for the thing that had to be wrong with it and instead found fun. I told my snobby-sense to shut up. The wine still hadn't passed the ultimate cheap wine test, though. Would this give Stan a headache? I didn't want to ask him to drink it since I was pretty sure it was going to cause him trouble. Stan tried it of his own accord (so glad I didn't tell him my reservations) and Rex Goliath passed with flying colors!

It feels pretty good to know that even in the beginning of my wine studies I was making good choices. On the other hand, it brings home for me again the difficult question of how much a good thing is worth. If I can find a good bottle for under $10 and a great one for $15, it becomes much more difficult to justify buying the excellent ones at their lofty prices. Maybe I'm missing something here, but in the meantime I can afford to splurge for fabulous food to go with my yummy cheap wine.