Rhiannon Red Wine & American Horror Story: Coven

“You drink my torment like wine.” – Papa Legba

What better way to spend a cold winter’s evening than with a bottle of red wine and something spooky to binge watch? The only better way might be brewing up a potion and practicing spells in your lair, but in lieu of that we’ll do the wine thing.

American Horror Story is especially good for binge watching because each season can be watched as an individual and complete show. It’s great because you can go in any order, you can watch just one or all three current seasons. This particular season, the third, centering around a coven of witches in modern day New Orleans was the most anticipated and according to some critics the most disappointing. Coven certainly had a lot of promise and also a considerable amount of failures. The plot seemed to wander and fell apart at the end of the season and the character and theme development only made it half way to where we wanted them to go… BUT. I want to talk about the things that I loved about Coven.

#3: HATS. But seriously, the fashion in this season is incredible. Inspiring. From the glamorous diva looks of Madison Montgomery (Emma Roberts as pictured above) to the morose teenage styling of Zoe Benson (Taissa Farmiga) to the straight up coo-coo looks rocked by Myrtle Snow (Frances Conroy), the looks are over the top in just the right way. Not to mention Jessica Lange’s tempting succubus character: Fiona Goode. If I keep talking about this, I’ll write all night.

#2: Bitchcraft. This is not just the name of the pilot episode of the season. Even though the final catfight between Misty Day and Madison went a little off message from the show’s original girl power spirit, we all enjoyed the bitchy banter and stone cold one liners that the show delivered. When Madison woke up (from being dead that is) and said, “I need a cigarette,” I laughed so hard wine came out my nose.

#1: A different kind of creep. Season one of AHS was spooky like a ghost story should be: a classic tale of a haunted house. Season two was down right terrifying, gory to the point of being visually sickening and fascinating at the same time. Season three however has something different. The things going bump in this season are the characters own wills and desires, the things that scare us the most: greed, lust, the desire for power.

#0: This is too important for a number. Stevie Freaking Nicks. The White Witch joined the cast as a guest star, showing up in two episodes and starring in a trippy, fantastical musical number that opened the finale. Stevie, in all of her shawl twirling glory, has still got it. The Fleetwood Mac heavy soundtrack leads me to the wine that was the perfect pairing for this season…

Rhiannon, a 2011 California Red Wine, comes to us from Rutherford, the Family Owned Winery of the Year 2012 (New York International Wine Competition). The incredible, perfect, fitting name aside, the spirit of this wine is in the exact right place. The label tells us that it is a tribute to the family’s Welsh roots, named after and inspired by the Welsh goddess Rhiannon. A blend of Petite Sirah, Barbera and Zinfandel, this wine is as smooth as Fiona Goode’s lies. Be careful, because it will put the devil in you before you even notice. Rhiannon tastes how I imagine that magic works, subtly yet powerfully. I definitely wouldn’t call it sweet, but there is nothing hard about it. I can imagine it rolling around on my tongue with no sharp corners. There is a little bite, a little something underneath that I can only call complexity, but none of the bitter after taste that some reds have. As the bottle says, it is indeed, “divine.”

Pairing Notes: Drink and watch this combo when you’re in a dark and mysterious mood. Be sure to light white candles to keep away evil spirits, wear all black and gather your sistaaaaahs (said in the style of Bette Midler in Hocus Pocus) around you.

Movie Facts from IMDB.

More wine information here. 

[yellowtail] Pinot Noir and Frances Ha

“We’ll take the most expensive bottle of vodka you have and… everything that comes with it… You’ve got this, money wise, right?”

This movie was so good that it brought about a revival of my blog. Yeah I said it. This is something that Matt & Kim have previously been known to refer to as The Rad Shit Factor. When you see something amazing and it makes you want to create something amazing and so on and so forth. Anyway, Frances Ha is a film that has been referred to as a love letter from Noah Baumbach (Director) to his girlfriend, Greta Gerwig (who plays Frances). It is a part of the Mumblecore movement, which is a whole other thing. It is also entirely shot in black and white.

The major point that I want to make is that this movie is everything that we wanted the show Girls to be. The film manages to capture not only what real girls are really like but also what it is really like to be real girls. It's encouraging to see a portrayal of people in their twenties who don't have a real plan or whose plans just aren't working out that are somehow both realistic and not totally depressing. 

SAT Practice Time: 20-something women are to now as wise-beyond-their-years-teenage-girls were to the 90’s.

We have been satirized and iconographied within an inch of our lives recently. For whatever reason, the spotlight is on us in all of our post-college-pre-real-life glory. And everyone that was not a part of Frances Ha is doing it wrong. 

It’s hard to explain the film beyond an IMDB-type synopsis saying that Frances is struggling and she is struggling hard. Although there’s certainly an arc of self-discovery, the actual plot is a rambling series of events in Frances’s life. The other characters drift in and out of her life in a way that is utterly believable, making you miss them when they aren’t around like they're your own friends. Frances herself is charming, stubbornly flawed and deeply likeable.

Now, let’s talk about [yellowtail]. You’ve seen it. It’s seen you. The row of bottles with simple labels depicting a cute, orange kangaroo representing just about every variety of wine known to the casual wine drinker has likely caught your eye more than once. (Fun Fact: It’s actually a Yellow Footed Rock Wallaby.) [yellowtail] advertises itself as the Go-To Brand  and this is completely reasonable. When you pick up a bottle of this you can expect a certain level of quality for just under ten dollars. I chose a Pinot Noir tonight because that’s just what you pick when it’s snowing out and your best friend is cooking chicken noodle soup for when you get off of work.

This wine is dry but not too dry just as Frances Ha is sad but not too sad. This isn’t strictly a comedy, but it’s funny. This isn’t a sweet wine, but it’s sweet enough. Like the finish of this Pinot, the resolution of the movie is satisfying, but it leaves you wanting more. In fact, Frances Ha is a Go-To Movie. 

Pairing Notes: Watch it over and over again. Watch it while you sip [yellowtail] with your best friend, watch it while you cook dinner, watch it while you dance around in your underwear. Try it with each variety of [yellowtail] in fact! 

Wine info from: http://www.yellowtailwine.com/

Movie info from: http://www.imdb.com/

Screenshot at top from Frances Ha via Netflix