I own a bottle. Treasured gift from a patient who passed after a valiant battle against cancer. I’ll never open it.
Ok, after about an hour in the cooler I gave it a shot. Pours a bright ruby/magenta that doesn’t really look like wine, slightly effervescent. Nose of blackberries and grape soda. Medium plus body, sweet but not syrupy. Palate basically confirms the nose, it tastes like grape soda, and if the grape soda company made blackberry soda. Alcohol is low (5%), finish is persistent, but not entirely pleasant, likely due to the sweetness.
Honestly, it’s not wine. I would liken it more to Seltzers, or an RTD cocktail. It’s 5%, it’s sweet, so I get the mass market appeal. I did not find it disgusting, but if you were in the mood for something like this, you could probably find a decent Moscato D’Asti for not too much more. The Elvio Tintero/Kermit Lynch Moscato D’Asti comes to mind for almost the same price, and is actually wine. Not sure if it’s better or worse than something like Bread & Butter Cabernet. There are a few similar products out there as well, which are basically Moscato with flavor added, like Villa M.
Interestingly, they do provide nutrition facts (110 cals per serving!) and an ingredient list on the back label, which includes Wine, Water, Grape Must, Sugar, Color Added (Grape Skin extract), Natural Flavors, Sulphur Dioxide (Antioxidant), No Added Juice.
EDIT: Thought I’d add a pairing suggestion. To me, this should be poured over ice in a red solo cup, serve with hot dogs/burgers at your Summer block party.
It has a lot of money behind it. Unfortunately, I don’t think much of it goes into the wine itself so much as the marketing of it.
It is in fact an LA winery, called San Antonio winery. The family was Italian and they made wine from CA grapes, but they wanted to expand. The grandma had come from Italy so they got some property in Asti and created a slightly sweet sparkling wine. Martini and Rossi were making Asti Spumante since the 1800s, and that was popular, so Stella Rosa came up with their version of Moscato d’Asti, as another sweet, bubbly wine.
Today they have something insane like two dozen flavors, including peach and pear. As to their market, well, there’s this:
The Stella Rosa Black Red Blend Wine comes from Stella Rosa’s Luxury Collection and is a semi-sweet, semi-sparkling red blend. It’s a low-alcohol grape wine made from a proprietary blend of grapes, most notably the Brachetto grape.
Stella Rosa Red is a seductively delicious semi-sweet, semi-sparkling red wine from the Luxury Collection that will bring out your inner femme fatale.
A few months ago, a bottle of Stella Rosa Black ended up in my 'fridge. After trying some out - it was just way too sweet for us. Think of a flavored Lambrusco with Coca Cola levels of sugar. Think of it as a soda - and it’s not that bad.
However, I decided that there was a better culinary use for it. I ended up making reduction and using it as pancake syrup. Believe it or not, it was really good. It could probably be used instead of a Port wine if you were looking to change things up for reductions.