It’s time to tackle the first group of wines from the 2026 Costco Wine Advent-ure Calendar. Corkscrews at the ready!
For more info about the 2026 calendar–and a complete list of the wines–check out our earlier post.
There are 24 wines in the box, and I’ll be reviewing them in four groups of six. At the bottom of each post, I’ll identify a favorite from the batch and recommend a food pairing for it.
And here they are…wines #1-6:
Disclaimer
Last year, I got some pretty spicy comments on the blog in response to my Costco wine reviews. Some to the effect of, “Hey, I really liked this wine that you reviewed poorly, you idiot.”
To that I will just say, these are my opinions. Don’t let me harsh your mellow. If you want to drink weird chocolate-flavored wine from Costco, then you do you. Please.
I’m no expert or authority, just a person who writes about wine. I have plenty of opinions and biases, and I have a big long article on the blog about what I think makes a wine good or bad. You can read it here if you wanna.
Now, I have 24 half-bottles of cheap booze to taste. (Not all in one night–I’ve been doing them one at a time.) Let’s get into it!
Costco 2026 Wine Advent-ure Calendar: Wines #1-6
There are four reds and two whites in this bracket. We begin with “Tranquille,” a rather unpromising Spanish red blend:
Wine #1: Tranquille Red Blend – Spain
Medium purplish-berry color with a slight haze. Aromas of heavy vanilla extract, red plum, berry lozenge, cinnamon, potpourri wood, toast, and sarsaparilla. Flavors are simple and confected: blackberry candy and vanilla frosting. Mostly dry despite its sweet and spicy aromas, with medium acidity and medium ripe tannins. No finish to speak of. Smells like oak and tastes like berry candy or cough drops. Manufactured and weird. Grade: D
Wine #2: Sheep Station Sauvignon Blanc – Marlborough, New Zealand
Very pale straw color with slight effervescence. Medium intensity on the nose with aromas of lemon, lime, lemon verbena, green mango, soapy florals, and very light jalapeño. The palate is simpler with green apple/green pear, lime juice, faint green pepper and a metallic taste. Bone-dry and light-bodied with high acidity and light flavor intensity. Short and dilute. Inoffensive, but two previous Sheep Station vintages were better. Grade: C+
Wine #3: Seaworth Pinot Noir – Chile
Red cherry, vanilla, and indistinct herbs on the nose. Middle-of-the road body, acidity, and alcohol. It brings candied red-fruit flavors of cherry, red plum, and cranberry with noticeable residual sugar. Some unripe herbaceous tannins show up on the finish, complicating but not improving this juice-box red wine. No real Pinot identity, and too sweet and simple to be the least bit enjoyable. Grade: D
Wine #4: El Campeón Beba de los Santos – Spain
A rare indigenous white grape variety from Spain. (Neato!) Pale lemon with fine dissolved bubbles and a slight reductive sulfur note that blows off quickly. Apple, pear, poached yellow peaches, and yellow citrus (lemon and grapefruit peel) on the nose. Flavors of pear, pineapple, and citrus pith with medium-minus body and a distinctive chalk/mineral finish. Rounded acid and barely off-dry at 11% ABV. Wimpy flavor concentration, but acceptable as a chillable white. Grade: C
Wine #5: Meadow Moon Zinfandel – California
Eye-stinging ethanol and sulfur vapors. Strong aromas of fermentation conceal a sour strawberry/cherry fruit profile. I almost didn’t put it in my mouth, but then I got brave. I found it tart and simple, with a thin texture and some smoke and raisined cranberries. Not good juice, folks.
I should note here that something is going on with the corks on this year’s calendar. None of them are very tight-fitting when you pull them, so they come out damp. The Zin’s cork had seepage about 90% of the way up one side of the cork, and the wet end was disintegrating into long shreds. So not only did my bottle have an obvious reductive flaw, but possibly a closure failure, too. Grade: F (faulty)
Wine #6: Aralena Garnacha – Spain
A mild relief after the first three (pretty miserable) reds. This Spanish Garnacha has a neon-bright ruby color with aromas of blackberry, jammy raspberry, cherry soda, light smoke, vanilla, and sweet spice.
Dry and medium-bodied, with high-ish alcohol (14%) and flavors of cherry pulp and pie. There’s some cheap-o oak in here, methinks–but it’s not as egregious as Wine #1. Would drink it on a desert island. (But probably not anywhere else.) Grade: C-
The Best (?) Wine of the Bunch
I will point out the obvious and say that this has not been a strong start for the 2026 calendar.
In fact, the only bottle that my tasting partner and I both agreed to finish was the Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc. (She “nope”-ed out on the Spanish white–I actually liked it.)
So, the results are in for this group. The winner out of the first-round wines was:
🌟 #2: Sheep Station Sauvignon Blanc
I paired this light-bodied Sauv Blanc with a big, messy bowl of Pulled Pork Crazy Nachos. The wine was a refreshing counterpoint to smoky carnitas, chili beans, and rich sour cream. Its slightly green character and modest alcohol nicely complemented my very spicy homemade jalapeño pickles and red onions.
Review disclosure: I was not compensated or provided any free products for this review. Opinions expressed on The Wine Fairy blog are entirely my own.
Leave a Comment