What it means
Cheap, no-frills wine, usually the bottom-shelf stuff you buy for the price, not the label. It’s what you pour when nobody’s trying to impress anyone, and it can be red or white. The nickname’s often linked to British soldiers mangling the French vin blanc in wartime. It might taste a bit rough, but it gets the job done.
Usage examples
"What wine you bringing? Just chuck a bottle of plonk in your bag, we’re in trackies, and Dave’s already smashed the crisps."
"We grabbed a bottle of cheap plonk and sat in the park all afternoon."
"It's only plonk, but it goes down nicely with a takeaway on a Friday."
"We were skint, so it was supermarket plonk and a packet of Hobnobs on the balcony."
"Don’t sniff at it, mate, it’s only plonk, not poison. Stick it in a mug and crack on."
Where it comes from
Plonk is widely traced back to British and Australian soldiers in World War I mangling the French vin blanc into something like plonk. It started around rough wine, then loosened up into a handy label for any cheap bottle, red or white, bought for getting poured rather than getting admired.
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