Should Your California Wine Have Pumpkin & Spice? A Holiday Debate
Taste Test: Trader Joe’s vs. Total Wine’s Festive Chardonnay
Should we add fruit or vegetable flavors to our California wine? Would these additions fill our palate with peace & joy this holiday season? Let’s consider an interesting possibility for holiday wine.
We recently heard about a Pumpkin Spice Chardonnay by Schied Vineyards (one of the 700 pound gorilla winemakers in the state you never hear about.) They’re producing private label wine for Total Wine and Trader Joe’s with added flavors for your holiday season.
Traditional beverages infused with fruits seem to be common lately. We consume beer with different fruits. We quaff orange, mango and berries in our suds. You’ll find fruit in hard seltzer like mango, berries, lime and cherries. Several years back vodka was on a tear with all sorts of added fruit flavors. And then of course there is coffee with pumpkin spice, caramel and recently we spied a Harry Potter branded Cauldren Cake flavored creamer.
| ‘Did we just write ‘vegetable forward? You be the judge. If you like sweet, try TJ’s. If you like drier wine, try TW’s.’ |
But, do you want fruits or vegetables in your vino? Pumpkins have an identity conflict. It is scientifically a fruit but treated as a vegetable in the kitchen. For our consideration we’ll call it a vegetable. This wine is something we just had to taste a side by side.
Trader Joe’s version sells for $6.99 while Total Wine’s version will set you back at $12.99. Could one taste better?
We had our doubts when investing $20 for the two bottles. Four of us, three passionate Chardonnay fans along with this scribe who enjoys a Chard, but doesn’t reach for it very often.
This is how the conversation unfolded (almost verbatim, edited for brevity.)
Erin – “Holy cow! Okay, I’m done. I can’t drink either wine.”
Lisa – “Oh my God! It’s not as bad as I thought it would be. It tastes like it has apple in it too. Yeah, this one tastes like it has a lot of apple spice or something.”
James – “Interesting. The TJ version tastes like it has apple. Is that what you get? Yeah. Okay. Apples. Do you get pumpkin? I get the pumpkin, but also pumpkin and apples. Okay. So there’s a difference between the two. I think there’s a clove and I don’t get pumpkin in this one at all. Okay, I like this one (TJs) better than this one (TW.) The Trader Joe’s might be better mulled. You could taste the spice. You could taste the apple cider
Bill – “That’s a good description, it’s a candidate for mulling. And this, the Total Wine version feels like I can taste the stainless steel. It’s more acidic, drier than the other one. “
Would You Buy It Again?
Erin – No. I’ve tasted worse things in my mouth.
Lisa – No. Just no, I would never buy it without tasting it. I wouldn’t have bought it in the first place because I don’t like pumpkin coffee. I don’t like pumpkin tea. I don’t like candy like creamer.
James – I just tastes sweet. Yeah, it tastes sweet, and there is a bit of spice in it that that just that’s not what I want in my wine. I think mulled would be a good way to enjoy this wine. Yeah, it’s definitely a wine to heat up for Mulling. Yes, I’d buy it.
Bill – As a freebie wine for a party, yes I’d buy it as a novelty. But, I wouldn’t drink it.
So, there’s a slight preference for Trader Joe’s version with it’s spices, apple & pumpkin. Whereas the Total Wine was less vegetable forward with less spices & pumpkin.
Did we just write ‘vegetable forward?
You be the judge. If you like sweet, try TJ’s. If you like drier wine, try TW’s. Both vintages are limited bottlings.
Happy Holidays.
Some notes on our wine ranking system.
Bill & Erin Hodge write about California Wine, the estates & winemakers producing them and educational information about Vino. Living in California Wine Country provides a front row seat to the places you want to visit the most here in the Golden State.
– -✰ means -What’s next on your list of wines
-✰ means -Not liking it too much
✰ means -We’ll drink this wine, especially if it’s hosted!
✰+ means -You’ve got our attention and we might buy this wine.
✰+ + means -We’re hooked and we’re going to buy this wine.
When you see -✰/✰+ with a slash, it means we disagree.
