Would a wine fridge work?

Plenty of people do both of those options.

 

a good solution for cellaring on the cheap is to spend your time on Craigslist looking for used refrigerators. they come up all the time. if you live near a college town you will find many smaller fridges this time of year. sometimes they are almost free.

spend some money on an outboard temp controller. the dial kind work great. digital is nice but not really required.
http://www.amazon.com/Johnson-Contr...r_1_2?s=kitchen&ie=UTF8&qid=1430074524&sr=1-2

that will be all you need until your cellar bets too big.
Cheers.

 

If you get a mini fridge you'll need an external thermostat to adjust the temp. Even if the fridge is set at the highest temp possible it will still most likely be in the safe food temp range and too cold to truly hit cellar temps.

 

the temperature controller could not be easier to use.

place the temp controller senor in the fridge. this is a thin wire that will slip beneath the rubber seal of the fridge door. just place it against a wall and not directly onto the cold plate. tape it to a shelf if you like.
set the thermostat in the fridge to the coldest.
plug the fridge into the thermostat.
plug the thermostat into the receptacle.
set your temp on the dial.
the outboard controller over rides the internal fridge temp. when you get to the desired temp the fridge turns off. once you get 3 degrees above the set temp it turns back on. the electronic controller allows you to set the differential (more or less than 3 degrees...) but that is about it.

Cheers.