Just about every single item that’s sold at the supermarket has some usefulness. Even the most obscure processed meat, bizarre seasoning blend or suspicious-looking canned seafood, has someone, somewhere, who considers it an essential component of their diet and refuses to live without it; even the most mysterious cooking aids, like Kitchen Bouquet, have their uses, and there are cooks who consider them to be indispensable. But there’s one item lurking in your supermarket that you should really never cook with if you want to up your cooking game: cooking wine.
Cooking wine — that is, low-grade wine that’s been mixed with salt and preservatives including potassium metabisulfate and potassium sorbate — has zero use in a kitchen. We’re not talking about Chinese cooking wines like Shaoxing rice wine, which are brewed especially for cooking and are crucial to capturing authentic Chinese flavor. We’re talking about the cheap, bottled “cooking wine” from brands like Roland, Goya and Holland House and labeled “Not for sale or use as a beverage.” If you regularly use cooking wine, we suggest you stop immediately and instead cook with real, drinkable wine.
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