But for those of you who—like us!—are pinching pennies, rest assured there are great-tasting budget wines that will charm both your palate and your wallet.

Here are two of our most recent discoveries:

Gato Negro

Gato Negro (that’s “Black Cat” in Spanish, for all you gringos) is a Malbec from Argentina, one of our preferred wine countries. The 2010 variety is quite good, and at only $3.99 (at Randalls) you might pass it up for being TOO cheap.

Don’t let the bargain-basement price fool you! This is a great choice for pairing with any spicy dishes like our homemade tacos or Beef Chili with Bacon and Black Beans, or anything with red meat (Bleu Cheese Bacon Burgers) or tomato sauce.

Sea Ridge

A California Chardonnay, Sea Ridge‘s 2009 variety is also an amazing $3.99 (again at Randalls). As the back of the bottle describes it, “This is a full, ripe Chardonnay with hints of tropical fruit, citrus, and butterscotch.” Celebrity Intern and I tried it with shrimp last night (see his “hot damn, shim does shrimp!” post at diet-of-insects for the recipe), and it was a great accompaniment.

I would also recommend pairing it with grilled chicken or a Caesar Salad.

More Cheap Thrills

Looking for something special for Thanksgiving, or a great gift for the holidays? Wine.com is currently offering some “spooky deals” over Halloween weekend. Check out their site for more cheap thrills, as you can save up to 50% on selections you won’t find anywhere else:

Sad to say, so far we just haven’t found anything that measures up to that pure garlic kick we love. (Heck, I even emailed Renée’s to ask where I could find ‘em here in Austin, but so far their customer service department hasn’t bothered to reply.) We’ve tried Ken’s Creamy Caesar, Marzetti’s Supreme Caesar (they make a mean Ultimate Blue Cheese dressing that we use as a dip), Marie’s Creamy Caesar, and Safeway Select Fresh Garlic Caesar. The closest we’ve to the Holy Grail of the Renée’s Caesar is a mixture of Ken’s and Safeway’s Caesar dressings, and even that’s only okay.

What we really need to do, though, is whip up some homemade Caesar dressing, complete with anchovies!

Here’s the recipe I’ve got from Mark Bittman (the New York Times’ Minimalist) that I want to put to use, one of these days:

This recipe is from Bittman’s How to Cook Everything: The Basics, which is an excellent book (and now an iPhone app!) for anybody on a shoestring budget looking to get away from Kraft Dinner and ramen noodles on a nightly basis. It’ll teach you everything you need to know, and serves as a great Bible in the kitchen, the way some people look to Betty Crocker cookbooks or Julia Child. Since Bittman’s a lifelong minimalist, he’ll teach you how to produce big flavor from just a few good ingredients, and how to get the most of out of even the barest of kitchens (the dude actually cooks brilliant meals in a classically cramped NYC apartment with one of those miniature stoves and refrigerators, so he knows whereof he speaks).

In the meantime, I would suggest spicing up the Caesar with a turkey breast or even pork cutlets, pan-fried to perfection, if you think you’d be into it but don’t have the rotisserie chicken on hand. It’s a surprisingly versatile salad, and impresses people when you present it with real, hand-grated Parmesan cheese. I think that’s probably the key to looking good in the kitchen, in general, as a friend of mine once confided that her husband swore she was a brilliant chef solely based on her ability to buy the “good” Parmesan and grate it herself.

Rock on over London, rock on Chicago. Caesar salad in the hizzouse!