[evilduck]

> Then there's the myth that in dinner it 'evaporates' (TL;DR it does not in a meaningful way)

I'm going to take exception on this one. Alcohol acts as an _amazing_ pan deglazer and general solvent without any real substitute to carry flavors and aromas out of the pan and into the final dish. You don't even need much, maybe 2 tablespoons of wine get fond unstuck and dissolved. Some of it _does_ evaporate, you can literally watch it happen as it reduces in volume. You can flash evaporate a tablespoon of wine and return to a dry pan if it's hot enough. What it's not going to significantly evaporate out of is adding alcohol to an existing volume of liquid like a red sauce. It'll happen but not in an ideal or useful time frame. But for deglazing, try swapping your deglazing wine with broth, water or even vinegar and it's easy to see, smell, and taste that they are not functionally equivalent, an alcohol does the job so much better.

Now, if you or someone in your home has a problem with alcohol addiction or your religion forbids it, I'm not going to tell you to change your ways but for the average home cook (even a nondrinker) a bottle of wine kept next to the stove strictly for cooking purposes is an undeniably valuable tool.