Astor Center has moved its Moscato d’Asti wines into its Cool Room (a lovely glassed-off room that’s kept at a chilly 57° at all times), or maybe they’ve always been there and the store is just now putting up signs saying that’s where they are. In any case, I’m grateful, because I could never find the stuff before. I think the first time I had it was as part of the ridiculous and wonderful tasting menu I had at the best dinner of my life at wd-50, where it appeared late in the courses, after many, many other glasses of wine. I think that’s what it was, at least. Like I said, many glasses of wine. Delightful and bubbly and sweet, just perfect for dessert.

My last experience with Moscato was with the Death in the Afternoon cocktails I was making with my bottle of Lucid Absinthe (which, I will report, was all drunk up in less than a week. ….I had help.) That was sweet and pleasant, but I wanted to try it on its own, so I picked up one of the lower priced bottles, that had a placard that talked about how it would be paired well with yellow cake. Presumably not uranium, but what do I know about wine pairings?

As I sipped this, nicely chilled and so very gently bubbly, I was delighted by how softly sweet it was, but spent a while being puzzled by what the fruity taste was. Apricot? I thought. Peach? And then I went, well, no, dumbass, what this tastes exactly like is Muscat Gummy (“Its translucent color so alluring and taste and aroma so gentle and mellow offer admiring feelings of a graceful lady. Enjoy soft and juicy Kasugai Muscat Gummy.”) Shocking, that something made of muscat grapes would taste like this candy. Shocking, indeed!

In any case, this wine is very pleasant, with a low alcohol content that keeps it light on the tongue and very sweet indeed.

BUY IT AGAIN: Yum, yes.

Today at work I found myself tired, and grumpy, and beset by what medical professionals would call “lady pains”. I knew that after work I wanted to pour some variety of yummy, soothing alcohol down my gullet. I considered going to investigate the newly opened Whole Foods Beer Room and pickin’ me up a growler, because I love everything about growlers. Hell, at least 60% of what I love is just the name “growler”. But then my brains won out as I remembered that going to any sort of establishment guaranteed to bring yuppie joy on its opening day is more or less a guarantee to bring large crowds and annoying waits. So growlers will come later, and I promise to write when I get one. So to Astor it was.

I’m not going to lie to you. I walked in there and had an honest to god intention of buying a magnum of white zinfandel. I… I’m not proud. But you have to understand, my womb hurts, and I wanted something sweet and shameful. However, when I came around the corner to the shameful section of wines, there were two employees standing, like, right there, and I just couldn’t do it. And after three or four laps around the store (discovering that they carried not only Lichido Lychee liqueur, which my mother has craved since we went to Japan, but also Lucid, the new absinthe brand available in the states, which will so be a next paycheck splurge) I settled on wanting something sparkling, and sweet, and found an old friend.

I’ve had Pêche Imperiale a few times before. The wine is “a harmonious blend of traditional champagne method Saumur wine with natural essences of peach.” What this means is something that tastes like a cross between a pêche lambic ale and a sweet sparkling wine. The peach flavor is actually not too strong; it’s very present in the aroma and the aftertaste, but most of what you get on your tongue is just fizziness and sugar. A lambic would have been better, but for the same amount of liquid, you’d pay more and get less of an alcoholic kick, and sometimes you want a freakin’ alcoholic kick.

All in all, a decent sweet little treat. Great for dessert, or just for fun, and utterly horrid with food. Tuna + red peppers + this wine = oof maybe I’ll just drink water for now.

BUY IT AGAIN: Most likely, yes.

My best friend and boozing companion, Arielle, was not feeling too chipper, and had wanted to drink Sofia Coppola Champagne, with a straw, out of a little metal can. Because, as you might agree, this is a perfect recipe for making yourself feel better. But alas, that day Astor Center was sold out of the canned version of Sofia, and only had the bottle, which is just so not even nearly as fun. So it was a dejected roam through other sparkly things for us, looking for an intersection of cheap and bubbly. I won’t lie to you, if they sold Cold Duck there, we probably would have bought three bottles.

We ended up peering at the cava section, which I believe was new. I was intrigued, because I thought that word meant some kind of rodent or maybe was Spanish for “rabbit”. I realize now I was thinking of “cavy”, which is another word for guinea pig, and is far less sparkling, and usually not corked (guinea pigs are most often sealed with screw caps.) We had been dawdling in the store for a while, so I pointed at a bottle that hit the center of that Venn diagram that decides most of my alcohol purchases:

This non-guinea pig sparkling wine had little impact on first taste. Arielle and I both took a drink, looked at each other, then said, “Huh.” It was mostly mouthfeel, and little flavor on first blush. Further sips proved it to be nicely dry and crisp, the sort of bubbly that you’d want to drink outside on the Fourth of July while watching fireworks. It gave me a very nostalgic feel for exactly that sort of thing. It had little character or complexity, but I enjoyed it nonetheless, and suspect I will use it as a variation on an old trick I used to do: mixing cheap box chardonnay with nice pear liqueur or framboise. I think this will make a good medium for bubbling up a sweeter, thicker liqueur.

BUY IT AGAIN: Yes!