For the weekend, sir: The cash-strapped wine snob recommends ...

Praise cheeses, for they can turn a watered-down white into a winning wine.

This week I went back to the Wine Lovers Page and Robin Garr's list of wines with the best QPR, or quality-price ratio, to sample the second of two California whites whose price point is $15 or less. Bonterra Vineyards' 2006 Lake-Mendocino County Sauvignon Blanc lists for $12.99 (I got it at Safeway, where it was selling for $14.99, less a $3 "card savings," so arguably, I saved a buck).

Garr describes this wine as "attractive and complex, a very appealing aromatic blend. Good body and luscious fruit on the first taste, crisp and citric, refreshingly acidic hints of fresh-squeezed grapefruit and bitter orange." Thing is, while I got good fruit on my first taste, it flattened out immediately; apart from the acidity, there was really no complexity to speak of.