Which wines are best for cooking?

No such thing as ‘cooking wine’: if it’s good enough to drink, it’s good enough to cook with, and vice versa. Photograph: BK/Alamy

I’m not drinking, but have lots of good bottles of wine. What recipes are worth using them in?
Jo, Cardiff

“My strongest advice would be to hold on to them, take a picture, hug it, but don’t waste them on cooking,” says Luca Dusi, co-founder of London wine bar and shop Passione Vino. But I won’t call it a day just yet. “Cooking is all based on detail,” Dusi adds. “The recipe is the main body for the success of a dish, but the quality of the ingredients and their origin play a major part.” Wine in the context of cooking, of course, becomes an ingredient and the Guardian’s Fiona Beckett’s mantra is: “If you wouldn’t drink it, don’t cook with it.” (Hello, corked and “cooking” wine.)