This Exists: Cola-Flavored Wine

Quelle horreur! A French producer is attempting to woo the "Pepsi generation" by giving red wine a cola flavor. The segment of Châteaux en Bordeaux that has introduced the drink is keeping things pretty youthful, from the price tag (less than $4 a bottle) to the name (Rouge Sucette, aka Red Lollipop). The Telegraph explains that Rouge Sucette is about 75% wine; the rest consists of not exactly earthy-sounding ingredients like sugar and cola flavoring, plus water, for a total ABV of about 9%.

The Los Angeles Times points out that regular wine drinking is down overall among the French: About 17% of adults drink wine daily; three decades ago, that number was closer to 50%. But flavored-wine drinking appears to be on the rise, with 15 million bottles of concoctions like grapefruit-flavored rosé sold in 2012, and sales expected to rise to 30 million bottles this year. Intrigued? Make your own. As the New York Times reports, the beverage isn't a French invention. The Spanish have long been mixing up kalimotxos, a cocktail that blends equal parts red wine and cola, with a squeeze of lemon. (And sorry, France: It seems your much-lauded winemaking techniques may have originated in Italy.)