One taste and you’ll forget the game is on. A good amount of acidity and some light tannins show this to be the young wine it is (don’t feel you need to drink it as soon as you'd open that microbrew). The flavors are spicy cherry and plum and will keep you more than happy through the first half.

By the third quarter, you’ll look so pleased with your beverage of choice that I can guarantee at least a couple of your beer-guzzling buddies will be sampling your wine. Happily, you can afford a couple bottles of this winner, as it’s routinely found for $9.99.

A good pinot noir for under $10? I know it’s as implausible as the Immaculate Reception, but it’s true.

Still worried about drinking wine during the game in front of your friends? Just tell them that the winery was started by the lead singer of that famous ‘80s rock band called Castle Rock. There was no such band, but what football fan is going to admit that they’ve never heard of a famous rock group?

Cheers,
TSW

Football season is officially on in the U.S., and that’s always a tricky time for me. While I’m a fan and can yell and curse at the TV with the best of them, I’m not tugging on longnecks with my friends. As they crack cold ones, I corkscrew cabernet.

I don’t think the football community has a reputation for open-mindedness (“If you ain’t a Raiders fan you ain’t s**t” being a popular bumper sticker), and wine really doesn’t fit the agreed-upon game day accoutrement. Thus, I tend to get a lot of funny looks.

I think it’s made even worse when I open something more elegant and lighter than a big-ass California cab. Take this pinot, for example, which was opened up last Sunday.

Beautiful ruby-to-garnet color and a nose that lifts out of the glass with such strength, your beer-swilling buddies will smell it from the other side of the couch. And what they smell will put even their good beer to shame.

Spice (from baking spices to pepper), floral qualities, cherries and berries all do such a number on your nose, you won’t care that your team is getting killed.