People who don’t drink a lot of wine (that’s me) often wonder what to buy for cooking wine. For two reasons, I recommend buying six-ounce bottles of Australian wine, which come in four-packs for about $7.

The first reason is that, like most inexpensive Australian wine, it’s unexciting but not bad at all–perfect for cooking. And the small format means you won’t end up wasting any if you only need one glass to drink and one for the sauce.

The second reason is that the bottles have funny names. Usually I buy Hardy’s Stamp of Australia. They call their little bottles “Maties.” Today, however, they were out of the Hardy’s shiraz, so I bought Alice White.

Alice White’s bottles are called “Lil’ [sic] Joeys.” I can’t *wait* to say to Laurie, “Could you go to the QFC and pick me up some Lil’ Joeys?”