You're gonna get all kinds of different replies! After almost 5 years of not killing myself with booze I now do use a little red wine in my pot roasts, etc.
But for the first year of my sobriety I used good balsamic vinegar and I found it added a little more zest but did succeed in adding depth to my dishes.
I use Mirin when cooking chinese food and it's 12% btw. It's sold as a food condiment and I don't thing anyone checks the age of anyone who adds it to their food cart.
Just be careful with your motives when you plan on cooking with it. You don't need to by a big bottle of wine for most dishes. So if you must cook with it make sure you buy only the small 6 ounce bottles. That's usually more than enough for any meal...1/4 cup is plenty for even the deepest of beef dishes like bourgnion.
I did poach an entire salmon using my old recipe of a bottle of white wine and I gotta tell you I almost gagged and found that I no longer liked that recipe.
I've done it again with balsamic and fish bouillon and a ton of garlic and fresh lemon and I like it alot better.
Using wine with cooking is kind of the same as drinking near beer. It's OK for some but not for others. In my opinion early sobriety is NOT the time to mess around with finding out which type of alcoholic you are.
Just my 2 cents..
