My favorite is the white blend, a melange of three really interesting grapes: barbera, chenin blanc, and colombard, the last being a grape traditionally used for making cognac, all sourced from sleeper vineyards across Mendocino Valley. “Waves” is their line of attractively designed canned wines, available in white and rosé options, with a distinctive label by noted optical artist Jen Stark. Las Jaras - cheekily billed as “the first good celebrity wine” - is a collaboration between winemaker Joel Burt and comedian, actor, and author Eric Wareheim. I recently drank one sun-soaked and surf-sprayed on hour four of a seven-hour Oregon Coast beach day, and it was also just about the most perfect utility imaginable. A friend of mine who runs a nice grocery store wine program described this as “the ideal shower can,” and it’s really hard to argue. It is ideal for canning, an idea Old Westminster has absolutely nailed with a spritzy, orangey, skin-contact can that is shockingly easy to drink.Īll the natural wine bona fides are here: naturally occurring yeast, zero additives, unfined, unfiltered, and a lovely candy peach-ring color thanks to white grape skin contact. Westy’s piquette draws on the ancient winemaking tradition of using the second pressing of grape pomace (the grape bits leftover after an initial pressing), which naturally produces an effervescent, low-ABV punch-like drink beloved by farmhands and thirsty members of the lumpenproletariat. Old Westminster Skin Contact PiquetteĪs bottle shop stockists and mixed-use cafe-bar-lounge somms across the country will happily elaborate, Old Westminster of central Maryland are making some of the most-compelling wines in America right now, locational stigma be darned. Here are five cans that refresh and surprise in equal measure. There’s no wrong way to enjoy canned wine, but the category feels a little flooded now, frankly, which is a great place for consumers to start dialing in on the really good stuff. But also, we just drank more in general in 2020, an undisputed annus horribilis, during which adults drank more across the board, and adult women in particular increased their drinking habits by 41 percent, according to RAND.Īll this means there is a surfeit of canned wine on the American market today, some bad, some good, some otherwise forgettable, and some simply perfect to chug on a particularly warm August day. There are a couple of reasons for this: For starters, a round of more permissive regulations (regarding can size and availability) passed by the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau allowed for greater market access for canned wines, and opened up manufacturers to a range of product sizes and promotions. Gone, or at least mostly gone, are the stigmas around aluminum packaging being harmful to wine, although as with all wines you’re better off pouring into a wine glass before drinking to enjoy the full nuance and aroma.Ĭanned wine sales exploded in 2020, growing more than 68 percent to a market cap of around $200 million nationwide, according to Market Watch. But the trend has found full flower here in the third decade of the 21st century. It’s never been a better time to keep an open mind when it comes to wine ensconced in aluminum.Ĭanned wine is nothing new mankind has endeavored to put wine in cans for decades, from French soldiers drinking tinned wine in World War I to the California moscatel brand Vin-Tin-Age, which debuted in the 1930s, to the popular Taylor Cellars cans of the 1980s, served exclusively on airplanes. Alongside the hazy ales and myriad hard seltzers, you may have noticed an influx of refreshing wine cans in your local grocer’s refrigeration station, candy-colored Easter eggs of vinous refreshment just waiting for you to pop the tab. It’s summer in North America - the temperatures are high, and with them, the need for refreshment (with alcohol).
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