Senorial Sangria

Senorial Sangria

It's like I'm saluting an invisible ghost clinging to the ceiling.
"Here's to you ghost, your scary as heck and I respect that."

I had to photoshop a booger out of my nose.

This stuff wasn't a gift from my in-laws, it was an impulse purchase made during a visit to a new Mexican restaurant. Being a fan of south-of-the-border soda, I eagerly scanned the refrigerator behind the counter for Mexican Pepsi or Coke - the imported kind made with real sugar. My eyes fell on this, the faux sangria.

I had trouble making my soda desire clear to the woman behind the counter, so I gestured and pointed until her hand came to the right bottle. I asked for my meal to go, and she took the sangria bottle and put it a paper bag, then gave it that wino twist at the top with the bottle end sticking out. She offered to open it for me, assuming I was going to drink it on the street.

I'm still not sure if she thought it had alchohol and she was hiding it for me, or if that was just part of the play acting of imitation alcoholic beverage purchases.

After a precarious bike ride I got the stuff home, put it in the fridge, and popped it open last night. Not an easy task, considering the bottle cap wasn't a twist-off. This is a hard, hard life.

It smells like sweet, carbonated red wine. The smell was so convincing that I was afraid it really WAS sangria, and I had to reread the label before continuing. As you can see from the beatific look on my face as I take my first taste, the stuff is wonderful. It's no Australian kangaroo ginger beer, but I will happily drink this in the future.

It tastes like Concord grape juice with some other fruit mixed in, go figure, but the confusing part is that no natural ingredients occupy a prominent enough place on the ingredients list to warrant this. It does use natural sugar, which is always a taste plus. I've barely ever tasted wine, but I think this is a pretty convincing substitute. (I was later assured it wasn't by a wine drinking friend).

I can't get over how pleasant this stuff is. Maybe something terrible will happen to my urine and I'll have something more exciting to write later.

Finishing up the drink, I notice a pleasant trick of the bottle shape. The long, slender neck of the bottle creates the illusion of your having much more soda when you tilt the bottle back.

Really good stuff, my second favorite soda so far.