OK.  So, most of my friends know that this used to be my favorite wine.  And, OK.  It still is.

I don’t drink Cocobon exclusively as I do enjoy other wines.  But this little honey for, like 6.99 a bottle at Trader Joe’s, is still a winner as far as I’m concerned.  Once I bought a case of it because I was in the mood (not to get hammered–but to have a case of it around for a while.)

My palate is not very sophisticated in the wine department.  I had a job waiting tables at a 5 star schmancy place for a few months when I was in college and I never really liked it.  (I was more of a blue-collar waitress if you must know.)  The money was fine but I always thought it was so DUMB that we were supposed to memorize peoples’ orders without writing them down.  Why is that considered so high brow?  Honestly, it’s the opposite of smart as the whole reason the Phoneticians invented the written alphabet was so that we wouldn’t have to memorize everything any more!  I told the manager this fact several times but he never really bought it…

As a waitress at that restaurant I had to attend wine classes.  At the time I thought beer that came in bottles instead of cans was a high class drink so you can pretty much imagine me at the table testing the “bouquets” and discussing the tannins in a glass of wine.

As it turns out, I had “a nose” for wine and actually did like the class in the end.  It seemed cool to me then and still does that wine is , you know, evolving in the bottle.  It’s a living food.  I love that the  grapes have to very purposely struggle to produce the best juice.  What a great analogy for life, right?   Mostly, though, I just love the way wine tastes.  It.  Is.  So.  Good.

When I lived in Madrid years ago I really fell in love with beauty of drinking decent bottles of pretty good wine.  The Spaniards know how to drink (and they showed me… wow… but that was then) and while they fully embrace a quality wine, there is no shame in enjoying a less expensive bottle.

So maybe rather than “blue-class waitress tongue” what I actually have is a “Spanish tongue.”  Yeah.  Let’s go with that.  These days I enjoy wine on a regular basis and actually prefers it to beer (even beer that comes in bottles.)

Michelle’s tips on choosing wine:

1. Don’t feel intimidated!  Most people only think they know about wine anyway or maybe they just attended the same class I did and can throw around some aristocratic wine terminology.  To this I say “pish-posh.”

2.  Some stores have employee picks or, you can ask if there’s an employee who knows about the wine.  ASK THEM TO HELP.  They’ll love it.

3. Expensive does not always equal better.  Nope.

4. Most people know that smelling the cork has nothing to do with proper wine evaluation, so don’t do that.  Do check out the bottom of the wine bottle though.  A flat bottomed bottle is much cheaper to make than a bottle with a divot–especially a deep divot.  If the wine is put in a more expensive bottle it likely means the producer thinks it’s worthy of it.

5. Don’t drink Charles Shaw.  Yuck.  Sorry but “two buck chuck” is hardly even considered wine–even by blue collar waitresses.  This beverage is chemically processed rather than properly aged for faster production, which is why it’s cheaper than Coca-Cola (which I also don’t recommend.)  I may not be high brow, but I say pay a few dollars more and get a decent real bottle of wine.

6. Be sure to tell me if you find a good wine pick that costs between six and ten dollars.  Happy New Year!