Pour Autumn Down Your Throat

By Corky McRoberts
Wine Columnist

Around this time every year, you’ll start reading wine columns from pretentious pinheads about how autumn is perfect for reds or how autumn is perfect for whites. Chardonnay this, Cabernet that.

Boring!

As frequent readers of my column know, I know more than they do. What they might not know, however, is I know more than other wine columnists, too. They can sniff, swirl, taste and spit all they want, but they’re still wine-tards.

If you really want to get a taste of autumn, try these wines:

Three Lakes Pumpkin Wine - This splendid flavor comes from Wisconsin, which is best known for its cheese wine. This wine, though, comes from stomping on, as well as carving, pumpkins. If you pay close attention, you can detect feet and rust aromas.

But of course, the main flavor is pumpkin spice. “It’s the Drunk Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!” It’s as if Three Lakes fermented Starbucks’ pumpkin spice latte. I imagine the urine from various woodland creatures who made pit stops in the pumpkin patch triggered the fermentation, but Three Lakes continued the process quite nicely.

Imagine pouring a fine Riesling into a pumpkin shell, setting the pumpkin outside for all of October until it rots then drinking the wine directly from the pumpkin. That’s the magical feeling you get from drinking this selection. Enjoy!

Oak Leaf Cabernet Sauvignon - Oak Leaf isn’t just the brand; it’s the overriding flavor.

This wine sells at Wal-Mart for something like 89 cents a bottle. It’s a steal! What better taste for the fall season than dead leaves?

Indeed, the Walton family has taken bags and bags of dead leaves - not all of them from oak trees, mind you - and has come up with a very distinct flavor. The idea came when one of the Walton cousins - one they don’t speak of often - spilled a bottle of cab on the autumn ground and in a fit of panic began slurping it up before it soaked fully into the soil.

Angus Walton loved the flavor, so he snuck into the Oak Leaf facility and began dumping leaves into the barrels. Rather than dump the ruined wine, Oak Leaf officials decided to market it as cab.

Ignore the bits of leaves and enjoy the bliss of taking in the autumn ground.

Boone’s Farm Apple Blossom - This is like caramel apples in a bottle. It’s also like all sorts of apple candy dumped into the same bottle.

If you deal well with migraine headaches, try the supple Boone’s flavor. It’s like an apple-tini spilled into a bag of sugar and drowned a fairy - it’s that sweet.

But, as always, a warning: Boone’s products do not stay down. You will throw it up soon after consumption, so have a bucket handy.

Try this selection with Apple Jacks cereal. It also goes well with expired pork chops and apple sauce, as it kills any fungus or virus. Enjoy!