A Somm's Review of Trader Joe's Delicious Monster!
Y’all know I LOVE my Trader Joe’s affordable wines, and I don’t know about you, but I’ve been drinking a whole lot more of it during lately while we’ve been stuck inside… Whoops… Since I’m sure a lot of you are too, I figured now would be a great time to start a new series where I look to my resident wine expert Laura (who you may remember from this post) to give you a much more in depth review of a couple of my favorites.
Since I’ve been craving summer, we decided to start with one of my absolute favorite crisp whites, the Delicious Monster!
This is one of my all time favorite affordable whites! It’s one of the staples that I pick up at least one bottle of every single time I’m at Trader Joe’s, and the last time my parents visited I served it and even my very picky “wine shouldn’t be less than $15” dad approved. It’s light, crisp, perfect for spring/summer, and only around $7, so naturally, it made sense for this to be the first one to have Laura review.
So, I’m not going to lie, I went into this pretty confident because I actually really love this wine, and I have had a lot of you message me saying that you’ve tried it and love it too! BUTTTT, Laura was not the biggest fan.
The Delicious Monster is a blend of 60% Chenin Blanc, 20% Muscat, and 20% Chardonnay with an ABV of 12.5%.
Here’s what Laura said:
First off, this bottle is a screw top. Screw tops used to mean low quality, but this isn’t necessarily the case anymore. There are a lot of really high quality wines that are coming out of some really awesome wine regions that are using a screw top. This is more of an environmental change that’s happening in the wine world, so just because a wine has a screw top doesn’t mean it’s poor quality anymore, so that’s a great move that the wine industry is making, and definitely something to keep in mind when you purchase wine.
First, looking at the color, this wine is super light in the glass and in the bottle, which is a really good indication that it’s going to be light on your palette. So a Sauvignon Blanc is going to be much lighter in color than a super buttery Chardonnay.
Right off the bat, on the nose you get a lot of peach and orange blossom. Orang blossom is a big indicator of Chenin Blanc. For a wine that is 60% Chenin blanc, I’m happy that the Chenin Blanc is shining through so well.
First impression: It’s okay, but not great. Everything kind of diminishes on the palette. Right off the bat, the three things I get are orange blossom, peach and a little bit of minerality, which I personally really like. All three of these things are strong indicators for me of a Chenin blanc when I’m doing blind tastings. It’s great for quarantine when it’s ditch and your options are limited (keep in mind, this is my personal thought, and I haven’t spent $6 on a bottle of wine in I can’t tell you how long!) but overall not too mad about it. Overall I’d give it about a 5/10. Not phenomenal, doesn’t leave any memories, but I don’t hate myself for buying it. So right in the middle.
Now, for Laura’s affordable white wine recommendation:
For only about $3 more (depending on where you live) you can get an amazing Sauvignon Blanc from Honig. Honig is a family owned small producer who specializes in sustainable farming and solar power. Their winery and vineyards are solar powered, which is really awesome. They’re located in California, but you can find them at your local wine shop or Kroger. I bought this one for $10 at Kroger, so if you do live near a Kroger you should be able to find it there! This wine will give you a lot of really awesome notes of lemon zest, a little bit of lime, along with grapefruit. It’s a really nice, crisp white wine!
Okay, now that you’ve heard from Laura, back to me!
First off, like she said, she typically spends a little more on her wines, so a $6-7 wine is not going to stack up amazingly in comparison. It’s definitely not the best wine in the world, but I still LOVE it when I’m looking for a cheap, crisp white at Trader Joe’s and still fully stand by my recommendation. BUT, that being said, I was so excited to see that the Honig Sauvignon Blanc was her alternative recommendation because it’s actually one of my favorite non-Trader Joe’s wines that I pick up when I want to treat myself to something a little nicer!
Do you have a favorite affordable white?