YOUnity incorporates local flavors in ‘Maine’s House Wine’

Bottom of the Barrel: Myx Moscato and calamari is our summer diet

The hip-hop hot takes expressed in this column do not reflect the opinions of the Bowdoin Orient or Bowdoin College. However, hopefully, they do coincidentally coincide with those of President Clayton Rose.
Hip-hop and grapes are inexorably linked. Rappers have been discussing wine in their tracks for decades—from Drake’s tweet on October 1, 2012: “Dropped my phone in a glass of wine…just to give you an idea of where my life is at these days,”—to Drake’s line from 2013’s Pound Cake/Paris Morton Music 2: “Afterhours at Il Mulino/Or Sotto Sotto, just talkin’ women and vino.” Heck, rappers (one in particular, it seems) even cite their love of wine in print publications. Take Claire Hoffman’s April 2012 profile on Drake for GQ Magazine as a prime example: “At the ready are a bottle of chilled white wine and a pitcher of ice, for tonight we shall drink wine spritzers, his favorite beverage and also mine.”
Your intrepid columnists do indeed love wine. They also do indeed love hip-hop. Therefore, it is not without coincidence that the wine that they choose to review this week is doubly inexorably linked to hip-hop. Myx Moscato is Nicki Minaj’s wine. She raps about it. She appears in advertisements for it. She co-owns the company that produces it. The wine does not come packaged in a traditional, 750-milliliter wine bottle. Rather, it is sold as a four-pack of 11.2-ounce, capped bottles. Stylized like a curvier, sleeker bottle of Bud Light Platinum, complete with twist-off bottle cap, Myx Moscato promises to be a treat. This was not a wine selected on a whim. This was a wine pursued.
Poured into a standard 18-ounce wine glass, Myx Moscato is clear and lightly effervescent. It looks like water and smells like sugar water. Butterflies would try and drink Myx Moscato if you placed an open bottle in a meadow. Justin immediately thought of his summer evenings spent at the esteemed NYC institution, La Marina. Myx Moscato tastes like fruit juice, perhaps because it is wine mixed quite literally with fruit juice. Myx Moscato will—full guarantee—be the only moscato that these two wine reviewers will ever consume on nightclub couches. Myx Moscato is smooth. Myx Moscato is tasty. Myx Moscato comes in four small bottles. This is pretty cool. Porsche Panameras have four doors. This is pretty cool.
Perhaps our only complaint is that Myx Moscato does not come in a larger bottle. The size of the Myx Moscato bottle prevents it from being shared with friends at table. Myx Moscato is worth purchasing. Myx Moscato is worth bragging about purchasing.
Additional Notes:
Tonight's Soundtrack: "Truffle Butter" (2014) by Nicki Minaj feat. Drake and Lil Wayne (as if it could be anything else)
Justin: "This is a Socratic wine."
Will: "This is a moscato that would inspire me to write favorable comments on this column's online edition."
Nose: 0/5
Legs: 0/5
Body: 0/5
Taste: 0/5
Overall: 6/5

Bottom of the Barrel: Everybody hurts sometimes when sipping Falkenburg Riesling 2014

Wednesday December 25, 2002: Chevy Chase, Maryland
It was a still morning, 36 degrees Fahrenheit, and the smell of my mother’s mahogany balsam 3-Wick Candle filled the air. Christmas morning, bitches. Few moments in life are filled with more excitement and anticipation than the Christmas mornings of your youth. But this year was different. This year there was a craze sweeping the nation. This year Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire hit stores. I had sent St. Nick an analytical paper detailing why exactly I deserved a spot on the nice list. It was perhaps my greatest work. In return I had asked for one of the two games. Truthfully I had a preference for Ruby but I was in no position to be picky. So that morning, filled to the brim with enthusiasm, I immediately ran towards the Christmas tree. Within moments of shredding the Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer wrapping paper, I knew. Underneath that exceptionally crafted exterior laid a brand new Easy Bake Oven. Underneath that exceptionally crafted exterior laid disappointment.
Sunday, August 25, 2013: Dewey Beach, Delaware
The surf is soft as you wake Sunday morning, mouth tasting like crab cakes, heart heavy. You’re two weeks from starting your freshman year of college—you applied early to Dartmouth, but bygones...The broken air conditioner of your family’s timeshare, two blocks from the beach, clangs. Its noise is not why you slept poorly the night before. Love, or rather love lost is why you slept poorly the night before. Erica. Hell, did you ever love Erica? It sure seemed like it just two nights ago when you shared a Marlboro Gold with her under the boardwalk, enjoying the relaxed curfew earned at age 18. She was back in town from her freshman year at The New School, grown up, sophisticated, cultured. You thought this was your break. That’s when you asked the question, “So, how do you feel about long distance?” For three summers you talked with her at beachside barbeques, yearning for stolen kisses, late night confidences. There was an awkward silence in the air, each second feeling like an eternity, and then she responded “Sorry kiddo, I’ve got a man in the city.”
Monday, November 28, 2016: Brunswick, Maine
It’s past starting to get cold. It’s downright chilly. It’s dark. Our guts are heavy from a week of binge eating. However, our spirits are high. We arrived at Bootleggers, over in Topsham, with dreams of finding the perfect pre-final paper mood elevator. Copping a bottle of something toasty to cuddle up with. We were prepared to fork over more than the standard $10 for something special. We were overjoyed to find that for $12 we could get something exciting, though slightly a-seasonal: an ostentatiously packaged Falkenburg Riesling from 2014.
As wine columnists we’ve striven to toe the party line: wine is a pretty dang good thing. We’ve waxed poetic on how it can help set the atmosphere on a melancholy evening alone, how it makes you want to sit in the back of a Wraith with the starlights on the ceiling, how it is simply tasty and an object worth enjoying. We expected, when purchasing the Falkenburg ’14, to be stunned. The German wine comes in a 1.5L bottle stretched to resemble a cross between the majesty of the Saturn V rocket and the modernist je ne sais quoi of Brancusi’s Bird in Space. Loyal readers of the column will know that empirically, the cooler the bottle, the better the wine. Well, now we can say that’s not always the case. The ol’ Falkenburg is gross. A disappointment greater than that of Easy Bake Ovens or unrequited love. It is hardly worth noting flavor profiles. There isn’t much to say other than: were we you, we would not buy this wine.
Additional Notes
Tonight's Soundtrack: "Everybody Hurts"-R.E.M.
Justin: "I'd like to thank my parents for getting me all the Pokemon paraphernalia you could possibly imagine."
Will: "I feel like Yu-Gi-Oh! doesn't get as much shine as it deserves these days."
Nose: 1/5
Legs: 2/5
Mouthfeel: 1/5
Taste: 2/5
Bottle: 5/5
Overall: 1.5/5

Bottom of the Barrel

YOUnity incorporates local flavors in ‘Maine’s House Wine’

This piece represents the opinion of the authors:

October 28, 2016

Have you ever noticed that Bowdoin College is in Maine?

The valleys of Bordeaux. The dusty shores of Portugal. Napa. Great wine often conjures up Mediterranean climates, small plated meals, big price tags. Cheap wine often aspires to Mediterranean climates and small plated meals through fancy looking labels and overly complex names. Buyers may grab a bottle thinking they will escape to a small village in the foothills of Vesuvius only to find themselves still very much in the foothills of suburban New Jersey.

Well, folks, guess what? We may have found a reasonably priced bottle that aspires not for the Old World, but for our dear old Pine Tree State.

Our selection this week, YOUnity Winery’s House Wine, is unabashedly Maine in it’s branding. In fact, there are nine references to the state of Maine on the label alone. The bottle’s description speaks of “wicked-good pasta” and “wicked-good times” with family and friends. YOUnity’s branding is unpretentious, fun and whimsical. Not to get ahead of ourselves, but the wine is awesome. The bottle is even more awesome. No irony here—merely appreciation for a charming, New England graphic.

Upon uncorking, the wine pours pinkish-red. Think back to the mushed blueberries on your face during the summer of your fifth year. That color. The nose is distinctly sweet. The legs longer than a NASCAR race.

The initial taste was semi-dry and distinctly sweet. Our mouths were initially confused; blueberry wine serves as a distinct tasting experience from more traditional grapes. You often hear of berry notes in wine, but this is a berry symphony. Owner Clem Blakney emphasizes, “This IS NOT a blend with grape but 100% Blueberry from our supplier in Stockton Springs.” Blueberries are really truly the prime fruit. It’s impossible to name something that isn’t improved by the addition of blueberries. Pancakes, salsa, motor oil.

This is an adult complex wine for non-wine drinkers and wine drinkers alike. It is complex without being biting. It’s sweet without being Pixie Stix. It’s certainly a more delightful conversation than any talk anyone has ever had with our mutual friend Allen. This wine makes you feel good, and we sincerely think it is more than just the hefty 13.5 percent ABV.

Additional Notes:

Tonight's Soundtrack: John Cougar Mellencamp's Greatest Hits

Justin: "I feel like this wine is giving me a hug."

Will: "While drinking this wine, I really wish I were back home, scouring my old man's closet for some ratty Brooks Bros. polos."

Nose: 3/5

Legs: 5/5

Mouthfeel: 3/5

Taste: 4/5

Overall: 4/5

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