As much as I try to deny it, I am a little bit of a wine snob. I have sampled enough wines to know the possibilities and I want to maximize my experience every chance I get. I had been hearing all of this talk about Two Buck Chuck for a while now, but with no Trader Joe's in my area it had not really been an issue. Well, late last year a Trader Joe's opened up within walking distance of my house. I came face to face with the "chuck". But I would not buy it. I was convinced that even at $2.59 a bottle it couldn't be worth it.
If you are unfamiliar with Two Buck Chuck, let me give you a little background. Charles Shaw, the Chuck in Two Buck Chuck, tried his hand at the winery business in the 80's with little success. He sold his venture, and his brand, to Bronco Wine Company. Bronco is headed up by Fred Franzia, formerly of Franzia Brothers Wines. His company is a huge grower of grapes and definitely believes in the quantity over quality rule. Taking advantage of the recent grape glut in California, Bronco buys grapes at cut rate prices, and mass produces it's table wine. Keeping the Charles Shaw name, Trader Joe's markets it and sells their Two Buck Chuck by the truck load!
I wanted to see what all of the hubbub was about, so I decided on a grocery store challenge for this month's ViniCode. Every bottle had to be under $10 and readily available at the local grocery. Our selection included two of the Trader Joe's selections, a Merlot and a Cabernet Sauvignon, Barefoot Cabernet, Walnut Crest Merlot, and Dancing Bull Zinfandel. Read on to see the results. This month's tasters were Clare Aslaksen, Steve Beville and Ted Field.
Fifth Place : Walnut Crest Merlot
Over
the course of a tasting, wines change. Some open up through oxidation
and warming and the smells evolve. When we are conducting a tasting
that we know will end up on the web each of the tasters will start with
a different wine. This way we have documentation of the changes a wine
goes through over time. Most of the time, as a wine heats up, some of
the weightier chemicals become more volatile and can add to the overall
aroma of a wine. Walnut Crest, however, died. Steve started with this
wine and noted that he enjoyed the bouquet at the beginning but was
hard pressed to find any redeeming qualities at the end. Alas, Walnut
Crest seemed watery and burned on its way down due to a lack of balance
in the alcohol content. Two tasters said the predominant flavor
resembled varnish. YUM! But on the plus side there was a fruity
aftertaste that all of us found pleasant. Final verdict? No matter how
cheap this wine is, it isn’t worth it.
Fourth Place : Barefoot Cabernet Sauvignon
As
you can tell from the ViniCode, this wine shot straight down the
middle, which usually means that it is totally forgettable. To this
wine’s credit we did like the smell. It had a fruitiness to it that was
pleasant. However, that fruitiness seemed a tad chemical, like the
fruitiness in fingernail polish remover. The taste unfortunately was
just bad. It was difficult to put your finger on exactly what was the
problem. It was very bitter, but that didn’t seem to come from the
tannins (for a Cabernet this wine had surprisingly little tannic
astringency). Final Verdict? As with the Walnut Crest Merlot, this wine
was not worth it.
Third Place : Trader Joe’s Cabernet Sauvignon
This
is the first of the “Two Buck Chuck” selections. As with a lot of
inexpensive wines on the market, the initial aroma impression that this wine
leaves is the evidence of oak. We have mentioned before that oak can
mask a number of flaws in a wine. A lower quality wine can be made to
seem more “interesting” with all of the vanilla and burnt sugar nuances
that oakiness can provide. But as Clare so wonderfully put it, oak
should be a condiment, not the main course. Luckily when we tasted the wine the oak took a backseat to the fruit. And the wine was uber fruity,
again the hallmark of inexpensive wines. A little earthiness to balance the fruit would have made this wine a star! But overall the worst that can
be said of this wine is that it is uninteresting. It is fairly simple
and unremarkable, but not bad. The soda pop of wines. Final Verdict?
This wine is worth it, but we would hesitate to call it a value.
Second Place : Dancing Bull Zinfandel
This
was the most expensive wine of this tasting, so our expectations were
high (and I mean that in a relative sense). This wine is the perfect
example of how subjective wine tastings can be. I found the smell to be
surprisingly earthy and interesting. I even thought I detected some of
the characteristics of coffee (which can also be attributed to oak).
Clare, however, found this wine to be very distasteful. She found the
smell and taste to be very off-putting. As for the taste, I liked what
I believed to be a nice earthy quality. But the aftertaste did have a
kool-aid kind of quality to it. The overall impression from two of the
tasters was that it was not bad and relatively interesting. Final
Verdict? Steve and Ted would say the wine was worth it, Clare would start making vinegar!
First Place : Trader Joe’s Merlot
Well,
the vote was unanimous and you could have knocked all of us over with a
feather. Not only was the winner Two Buck Chuck, but that the Merlot selection
was so much better than the Cabernet! This was a nicely balanced wine.
The first smell to hit you was the fruit and then a nice supporting
vanilla. This wine had a lot of texture. I didn’t think that it was as
interesting flavorwise as the Dancing Bull, but the texture was a lot
more interesting. Steve even gave it a massive compliment. He said
“This is not Bud Lite, this is regular Bud!” Now don’t get us wrong. We
were excited to find this wine in an otherwise lackluster tasting. But
this wine possesses none of excitement of a good to great bottle of
wine. But it does not pretend to be “great” wine. Final Verdict? This
wine was not only worth it, it is a good value.
