Shopping for wine in your local store is pretty easy, even if you don’t know anything about wine: you may make a few bad choices here and there, but you’ll figure out which wine or wines you like best, and then keep buying those.
But during the holidays, as you head to dinners and parties outside of your neighborhood or out of town, you may need to pick up a bottle as a hostess gift or to share with other guests and find yourself in a new place, totally reliant on whatever Google Maps or Yelp tells you is the closest liquor or package store and with no time to spare. Then what?
Your challenge is my challenge this week: go to three unfamiliar stores and, spending no more than five minutes and $15, pick out a red, white and sparkling wine to impress people who know a little about wine and have strong opinions about what they like to drink. And you don’t have to take my word for it: we asked two Guardian editors with great taste and experience with wine on three continents to try out my selections.
