You may be slightly disappointed that, up to this point, everything I've mentioned has been cast in a positive light. This is partially because I am a generally positive person, upbeat and cheery right up to the moment where my training is activated by a subliminal message and I whip out the garrote. This is also partially because my taste in alcohol reflects my taste in films, which is to say, I'm not what you might call hard to please or especially discerning. After all, I grew up with a bunch of lighter fluid huffers, so anything that lacks the taste and scent of butane is going to taste pretty good to me.

But still, not everything is sunny, even for an easy-to-please lush like me.

When it comes to wine, there is a reason England is well-known for beer. Wine just isn't something you think of when you think of Merry Old. Ales? Well, of course, and I already reflected on my recent tour of London pubs and ales. But wine, well it's just not a signature substance for the former masters of the world, which is probably why they went about conquering so many places. They needed good wine from France and some food with actual flavor from India.

Still, my well-established affection for disrespected American fruit wines lends me a natural tendency to give the benefit of the doubt to any region. I'd try Antarctic snow wine if someone made it. So while we were touring the gift shop of the Tower of London (brief tourism aside: linger about and take one of the guided Tower Guard tours, but make sure you get the hearty, bellowing funny guy, and not the meek, serious old guy), I came across their little display of Tower of London wine and spirits. Tower of London ale and even mead seemed a safe enough bet, but I was naturally drawn to the more offbeat offerings on display, namely the elderberry or rhubarb wine. Since my mother was once witness to the discovery of a dead body back in Wheatcroft, Kentucky, in which rhubarb had taken root and flourished before anyone found the corpse, I decided to go for Tower of London Elderberry wine.

Elderberry wine and I have a long and storied relationship reaching way back to some Renaissance Faire I once attended at the behest of a girl on whom I had a crush. Since then, most of my Renaissance Faire jibes end up including some statement to the effect of, "What ho, noble Elf Maiden! Come, sit by my fire and I shall speak to you of my quest to find the fabled Spear of Yog Shylnnith +3 whilst we drain our leather mugs of elderberry wine. Looks to me as if ye could use a refill. Here, let me remove your mithril vest for you." Yeah, I'm always trying to pick up fair elf maidens, but the one time I got close, she invited me to a Renaissance Faire and then, a few days later, a free Billy Squire concert. I realized then that me and elf maidens just don't mix.

Nor do me and elderberry wine, for that matter. I know that to properly enjoy the stuff, I should have been wearing big Henry VIII robes and swinging around a giant turkey leg, but my robes were on loan, and all I could find was a single thin-sliced sliver of Boar's Head turkey, which doesn't have nearly the same impact when waved about even with the utmost drunken bravado, regardless of how big your robes may be.

I really have no idea what a quality elderberry wine should taste like, seeing as how it is usually fermented by bent witches living in thatched huts out in the middle of the Weirding Wood. So I can't say whether or not my Tower of London brand elderberry wine is indicative of the height of elderberry wine production, or if it's just some crap they threw together because they knew a touristy dope like me would come by and exclaim, "Elderbery wine? Huzzah! Quickly, Charlamagne, to the castle! Bring your turkey leg!"

But as far as Tower of London elderberry wine goes, here's the scoop. Upon uncorking it back home, I was socked in the nose by a rather pungent...I don't want to call it a bouquet, because that's not nearly violent enough. It smelled vaguely of fruit and flowers, but what pleasant scent may have existed was overpowered by the smell of alcohol. Not a good sign, but I've had some foul-smelling Italian wines that managed despite their aroma to still taste acceptable. So on I forged with the first sip, which I very nearly spit out. It tasted exactly like it smelled. Definitely full-bodied, I'll give it that. The only think I've had that was worse on first impression was a Georgian wine I picked up at a place along King's Highway -- and yes, that's as in the former Russian province, not the southern state. At least the Georgian wine had the benefit of a really keen bottle with a sloppily painted 3D relief of dancing Georgians in furry hats.

I had to step away from the ToL elderberry, though I was determined to finish not just the glass, but the whole damn bottle, because, well, I paid for it and brought it all the way back. After leaving it unattended for half an hour or so, I returned fully expecting it to have mutated into some sort of hideous tentacled lifeform like you'd find in a sleazy Japanese cartoon. Instead, what I found was that affording it half an hour to breathe made the wine, if not good, at least drinkable. It had the heavy taste of a below-average red wine, with hints of chocolate and oak and, I assume, eye of newt. Pairing it with a dinner did little to take the blunt edge off. In time, I was indeed able to polish off the bottle, but it was more of a grim death march than a joyous exploration. Every day, I'd trudge home withthe weight of knowing that I had to go home and take my elderberry wine. They say elderberries have incredible medicinal value. I believe it, because drinking elderberry wine sure is a lot like taking medicine.

I suppose if I was a plague-ridden peasant in a filthy hut, this'd do the job at taking the sting out of my misery and crippling sickness. Otherwise, when if comes to England, I'm sticking to beer.

Labels: Drink