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This week's question:

How Do I Buy Good Wine With Little Cash?

Dear Short,

No matter how much or how little you have to spend on wine, no one likes to feel as though he or she has paid too much for a bottle. In fact the ideal situation, from a wine-buying standpoint, is to select a reasonably priced bottle that tastes like so much more. The trick is knowing how to find some of these little discoveries that we call wine values.

Before we go further, please understand that a wine value does not necessarily mean buying the cheapest wine on the shelf. Value is getting the most for your money, and there are wine values in all price categories.

Here are some ways you can get the biggest bang for your wine buck:

1. Consider a lesser-known varietal. For white wines, instead of automatically heading over to the Chardonnay section, try a Pinot Blanc from Burgundy, or go with a crisp, refreshing Sauvignon Blanc. For reds, instead of Cabernet Sauvignon or Merlot, think about a Pinot Noir or a crowd-pleasing Rhone-style wine.

2. Look at wines produced in lesser-known regions. In California, for instance, go beyond Napa and Sonoma, both world-class winemaking regions, and venture into areas like the Central Valley where you'll be surprised by the quantum leap in the quality of some wines there. Expand your horizons and check out wines from the rest of "The New World," including Australia, New Zealand, and South America.

3. Get to know a winery's "second label." Some of the finest wineries in the world, from Caymus in California to first growth Château Lafite-Rothschild in Bordeaux produce other wines made from grapes that are not as high quality as those used in their showcase wine. A good wine merchant should be able to point you to some super seconds. In case you're wondering, the second label of Caymus is Liberty School, and Carruades de Lafite is the "super second" from Château Lafite-Rothschild. Other popular second labels are Hawk Crest from the highly-rated Stag's Leap Winery in Napa and Pavillon Rouge from the famous Château Margaux in Bordeaux.

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Is Old Wine Really Better?

Dear Confused,

Someone should do a survey on wasted wine. You probably have wasted some yourself. You crack that bottle for dinner and, for whatever reason, you don’t finish the whole bottle. Next day, you see the partially filled bottle and assume it’s gone, dead, undrinkable. You paid full price for it and you enjoyed only two-thirds. Here’s how to get more from every bottle you buy.

First of all, wines are like little kids: they’re tougher than we think. They contain alcohol which helps to preserve them. The more the alcohol, the better they will stand up to abuse (like leaving it open overnight). Red wines have the additional natural preservative known as “tannin” (it’s the mildly bitter-tasting component). In some wines, high natural wine acidity and/or residual sugar also preserve them.

But you can give the wine an even better chance of survival by re-corking the bottle and putting in into the fridge. Re-corking it keeps the oxygen out; and while some oxygen is good for wines (another column), too much will just spoil it. By putting it into the refrigerator, you lower the temperature of the wine. Remember chemistry class? Things change more slowly the colder the temperature? Works with wine, too! Most wines that are re-corked and kept cold will stay fresh and tasty for at least the three or four days that even a near teetotaler would take to finish them off. That vintage Porto or Sauternes? A month is not out of the ordinary in my experience. “But, I don’t like my red wines chilled” you say? Just take it out an hour before you want to enjoy it.