As a 20 something living in this bummy college town, there’s a sort of collective pride in drinking cheap booze — the “I can drink anything with a straw” mentality if you will. Vodkas that taste like the not-so-distant cousin of nail polish removers and beers that might as well be toilet brewed are the delicacies of college life.
Sometimes, though, just sometimes, it’s nice to give our bellies a break from the bloat. Wine has the reputation of being uppity and staunch, but ballin’ on a budget doesn’t mean we can’t indulge in wine without breaking the bank. The Emerald caught up with Liz Olsen of Oregon Wine Lab, a winery in Eugene, to walk us through the blue collar way to eat, drink and be merry. Just in time for New Year’s celebrations, here’s our broke girl wine guide.
“I spent my whole college career getting into wine for the same reason any young person would — it’s cheaper with a higher alcohol volume, there’s less bloating than beer and it’s more bang for your buck,” Olsen said.
Olsen graduated from University of Oregon in 2017 and is now the sales and event manager at Oregon Wine Lab here in Eugene.
“You have to drink a lot less wine to get as drunk as you do drinking White Claws, and I feel like the drunk is so much happier,” she said. Here’s when I coughed out a little “amen sister.”
“For me,” she continued, “this really helped elevate the idea of wine when I was first getting into it. I’m a firm believer in enjoying cheap wines and finding out what you like. I can sit here and tell you what you should like, but at the end of the day what does that do for me?”
As soon as we started to dive into the difference between wine trashy and shot trashy, I knew Olsen spoke the language of the people and that she was more than fit to guide us in the right direction for our next trip to Minute Mart. I brought enough bottles (and bags) of cheap wine to fill a duffel bag twice over with me to our interview. I pulled them out one by one, slapping them on the table in this boujee wine lab for all its silver spoon patrons to see.
“Righteous,” Olsen said with a nod as she brought us some glasses for tasting.
What’s to follow is a list of the wines we tasted, the college budget eats that can be paired with them and some tips and tricks to make everyone think you know what you’re talking about when you bust open your next bottle of vino.
Whites:
What we’re drinking: Charles Shaw “Two Buck Chuck” Pinot Grigio — $3.99 and Barefoot Pinot Grigio — $5.98
Olsen’s tasting tips:
“My recommendations are always to start off with white; white is a little less intrusive on your palette,” Olsen said. “It’s fresher, it’s lighter and it’s crisper.” At the wine lab, Olsen explains that she always starts her tasting flights with bubbles or a white wine to wash away whatever you ate beforehand and start every drinker off on the same foot.
Olsen sees me swirl my wine into oblivion, then stick my face in the glass for a great big inhale in an attempt to look cultured — something I thought I’d seen my dad do at a restaurant before. “One or two swirls for white wine and subtle sniffing is actually the way to go,” Olsen said with a laugh.
According to Olsen, swirling your wine around isn’t just for show; it actually changes what goes on inside the glass. She explains that when tasting white wine, it only needs a few swirls because it becomes flatter as it oxygenates and loses its aromatics while red wines benefit from aeration. She also clued me in that less is more with the sniffing, explaining that subtle sniffs to catch things as you go are more effective.
Cheap wine, cheap dine:
Charles Shaw Pinot Grigio paired with chicken Top Ramen
“The saltiness and the richness would balance out the acid of the Pinot Grigio, and the subtle sweetness would play this little act with the top ramen,” Olsen said. “You could doctor it up with some extra veggies, sesame oil, whatever you want. Even Mexican chorizo with some bok choy as a topper is surprisingly good.”
Barefoot Pinot Grigio paired with linguini and clams
“Since this Pinot Grigio is on the sweeter side, especially compared to the more acidic Charles Shaw, I’d pair this with linguini and clams,” Olsen said.
Here’s what’s on your shopping list — a half pound of clams, dry pasta (according to Olsen, always use dried pasta with seafood because it has an integrity behind it), white wine (which you are already drinking, duh), butter, parsley, garlic and that’s it.
Olsen’s advice is to splurge on the linguini if you are splurging on anything so it will act as a solid base. She also suggests thinking ahead by soaking your clams in water with a little bit of cornmeal for three hours before you cook to get the grittiness and sandiness out. Her last bit of advice on this ultra-easy dish is to keep some pasta water to drop in with the clams to add that glutinous extract for enhanced richness.
Rosé:
What we’re drinking: 19 Crimes Cali Rosé Wine by Snoop Dogg – $12.00
Wine anatomy breakdown for bozos:
“There’s three different levels on your palette,” Olsen said. “You have the first tip, the middle palette and the back palette, but the whole part of it is your olfactory zone which plays a part in how you smell versus how you taste. When you get the tip of the tongue, that’s where you get the first amount of zippy bright acidity. When it goes across your palette, you’ll feel the acid or the sugar. Anything acidic will make your tongue salivate, and if there’s sugar in it, you’ll get more of that coating feeling.”
Cheap wine, cheap dine:
19 Crimes Cali Rosé with a tart raspberry cheesecake for a sweet dish or fried halloumi with brussel sprouts, pomegranate and a balsamic glaze for a savory dish.
Olsen pointed out, while Rose is fruity, that doesn’t mean it’s a dessert wine. In this disturbingly hot pink bottle, we caught notes of raspberry and strawberry; Olsen said we could play those up with a tart raspberry cheesecake to pair.
If the savory route sounds more appealing, she suggested still keeping the motif of fruit. Since it’s a sweeter wine, she suggested using pomegranate on top of brussel sprouts to add an acidic twist. Pair this with a balsamic glaze and fried halloumi cheese, and you’re set with a dish full of texture.
Reds:
What we’re drinking: Yellow Tail Pinot Noir – $4.97
Old wine vs. new wine:
Before the tasting of our red, Olsen popped into her office to get a bottle of Oregon Wine Lab’s William Rose Pinot Noir to make a comparison. Between two wines of the same ages and calibers, there were loads of variations.
She brought out two pieces of paper so we could lean our wine glasses over them and take a look at the wine’s true color with an unobstructed background. The William Rose was aged longer and took on a more brown and dusty color. It looked richer and less watered down, something Olsen explained is seen a lot more in aged wines as opposed to a bright opulent color of a young wine.
She saw me squinting at what looked like bits of backwash in my untouched glass. And before I could ask what it was, she explained it was sediment. “Finding sediment in older wines isn’t a bad thing either,” Olsen said. “It just means they hung out long enough to create it.”
Cheap wine, cheap dine:
Yellow Tail Pinot Noir and beef stroganoff.
When Olsen starts getting into Stroganoff, she gives us two ways to tackle the low budget dish: the date night way and the lazy Wednesday night way.
Let’s start with the lazy way. Olsen recommends going to Safeway and grabbing a box of the classic Hamburger Helper brand beef stroganoff. After pouring yourself a glass of red, doctor your dinner with some creme fresh, green onion and dill to fancy it up.
Now onto the date night version. Grab yourself some stew meat, a can of cream of mushroom soup, Worcestershire sauce, egg noodles and homemake your stroganoff instead.
There you have it: the broke girl wine guide — courtesy of a wine expert who gets what it’s like to be a college kid here in Eugene.
