File this project under “It seemed like a good idea at the time.” A whole case of $4 mini wine bottles and a self-imposed Halloween deadline–what could go wrong?
Your fearless tasting team at The Wine Fairy has powered our way through the entire 2026 Costco Wine Advent-ure Calendar. Now, all that’s left to do is share the final bracket’s results with you.
If you’re just tuning in, you can catch up with all of our previous reviews using the links below. (All of these posts, including the one you’re reading, contain spoilers about the contents of the 2026 Costco wine calendar.)
We give a brief tasting note and a letter grade for each wine–and for the best of each bracket, a food pairing idea.
Wines #1-6: First-round reviews!
All caught up? Great. As we’ve seen, the 2026 calendar has been off to a sluggish start, quality-wise–and wines #19-24 are the last leg of this month-long, boozy relay.
Can these six bottles recover some lost ground and get the collection over the finish line? Or is the advent calendar doomed to lag behind Costco’s other budget wine-aisle offerings? Hold my corkscrew and watch this!
Costco 2026 Wine Advent-ure Calendar reviews: Wines #19-24
The first wine in this batch is called “Struggling Deep Roots”–but will it actually be that deep, or will we struggle to enjoy it?
Wine #19: Struggling Deep Roots Blaufränkisch (2023) – Dunántúl PGI, Hungary
Blaufränkisch is an important heritage grape in central Europe. It’s known for producing medium-bodied wines that burst with dark fruit flavors and peppery notes.
In Hungary (where it’s usually known as Kékfrankos), Blaufränkisch has a long history and can produce some terrific wines. It has an affinity for traditional oak aging, and is divinely flavorful when done well. All of these facts made me optimistic when I first picked up this bottle.
Our advent-calendar Blaufränkisch is a medium purple-red. Its characteristic fruit and spice aromas are accompanied by a milky, vanilla-laced overlay. Cherry yogurt, mixed spices, forest berries, and toasted marshmallow, along with some raspberry and rhubarb on the palate. Medium acidity, smooth tannins, moderate alcohol at 12.5%, and it’s…sweet.
Why is it sweet? I’ve never in my life tasted a Blaufränkisch that’s sweet, and now I understand why the style usually stays dry. The residual sugar dulls the grape’s peppery edge and flattens its diverse fruits into pie goo. And then there’s that artificial-tasting oak sitting on top of the wine like an ill-fitting hat.
It makes me ache a little inside that this will be, for some people, the first and last Blaufränkisch they ever try.
That’s my main gripe about this collection. We’re not just serving up lousy wine here–we’re actively alienating people from historic styles they might otherwise discover and enjoy. The wine itself actually doesn’t taste terrible, but I’m docking it a full letter grade on principle. Grade: D+
Wine #20: 12 Generations Glühwein Red Grape Wine with Natural Flavors (NV) – France
Speaking of emotional wine scoring…I have happy childhood memories of sneaking sips of Glühwein. I buy a liter of it from my local fine-wine shop every Christmas, and I endure the eyerolls because a ladleful of warm, spiced plonk makes my heart smile.
This version, dubbed “12 Generations,” is made in France. It smells mostly of holiday décor, like dried oranges, cinnamon brooms, and pine trees. Over-scented (and oddly resinous, too) with copal and bay-leaf aromas.
A weak palate of anonymous berry and red-apple flavors with no acid and no tannic structure. It’s strangely less cloyingly sweet than the Blaufränkisch that preceded it, petering out on a watery, cinnamon-apple note.
I didn’t bother trying it hot. Twelve generations of German aunties are looking down from Himmel and heaping Schande upon this feeble attempt at Glühwein. Grade: D
Wine #21: Blu Blu Peach Soju-Style Product (NV) – United States
Oh boy, now we’re in for a real treat: Blu Blu Peach Soju-Style Product Non-Vintage Grape Wine with Natural Flavors! Shall I dust off the decanter?
Mercifully, it’s not terrible, with clean peach-soda and melon flavors. Moderately sweet (at 12% ABV), it exits the palate with an ethanol burn that reminds you of taking a peach Jell-O shot.
I actually prefer the vaporous Everclear-like notes to the corn-liquor aftertaste you get with crappy soju. (This grape wine-based beverage isn’t made by distillation. That detail allows Costco to offer the wine calendar in places that only allow beer and wine sales.)
Simple? Yes. Stupid? No. Blu Blu knows exactly what it’s trying to be, which is candy-flavored alcohol soda. Young K-Pop fans will probably drink it up–as would an underage Wine Fairy, back in the day. Grade: C+
Wine #22: Brillo Solar Red Blend (2025) – Portugal
Deep ruby, with aromas of blackberry, herbs, vanilla, black cherry, and smoldering fruitwood. Off-dry, with flavors of red berry jam, campfire, and (weirdly) a lactic note of smoked gouda cheese.
Brillo Solar presents as a warm-climate, overripe wine with soft tannins–but it has plenty of hardwood. “This tastes exactly like a plank,” says my wife, Sarah. “But a pleasant plank.” Grade: C-
Wine #23: Secrets Revealed Grüner Veltliner (2025) – Dunántúl PGI, Hungary
Number 23 is fine, I guess. This year’s Hungarian Grüner is dry with some residual sugar and inoffensive alcohol at 12%.
An odd confectioner’s sugar/frosting note blows off quickly. It leaves behind some unripe peaches and watery grapefruit which are hanging around awkwardly together, like the last fruits at the party after the cool fruits have left.
It tastes mostly of grapefruit, with a strange little tickle of carbonation on the tongue. Yep, this year’s white wines almost all have a moderate amount of bubbles in them. (Fizzy still wine or flat sparkling. Take your pick.)
I gave the rest of the bottle to Sarah, who was getting desperate to catch a buzz after listening to an hour of Costco wine tasting notes. Grade: C
Wine #24: Ciel Bleu Brut Sparkling Wine (NV) – France
Confession time: Ciel Bleu is the last bottle in the sequence of 24, but I actually tasted it first out of this batch to calm my nerves for the remaining five wines.
That’s because I drank Ciel Bleu Brut Sparkling Wine last year, and I remembered it was an acceptable-to-middling pint of fizz. “Like someone put a passable house Chardonnay through a SodaStream machine” was my 2025 review.
Since then, I’ve been informed that carbonation-method wines are subject to different labeling requirements in France. But whatever–that sensory assessment still holds. The bubbles fly out of the glass at motion-blur speed, revealing a limpid pool of flat, pale juice.
Flavor-wise? It’s apple-y. There’s no real autolytic character, other than some animal-cracker biscuit-ness on the nose. Fresh yellow apple, baked apple, bottled lemon juice, a touch of vanilla. Air brings some subtle spice and herb aromas (fennel, menthol, white pepper, and turmeric). Acid is adequate. It has alcohol and bubbles and no obvious flaws–which makes this wine the MVP of tonight’s lineup. Grade: B
The fourth-round winner is…
In this flight of six bottles, we tasted two flavored “wine products,” two subpar renditions of beloved regional grape varieties, one sorta-drinkable Portuguese red blend, and some budget Brut.
We must name a winner. It’s not a crowded front of the field, folks, and we’re very, very tired.
The Ciel Bleu sparkling wine got the actual highest score, but we chugged the whole thing before dinner. So the winner (by default) of this round’s food-pairing prize is our second-place contestant:
🌟 Wine #21: Blu Blu Peach Soju-Style Product (NV) – United States
I respect its directness. I admire its hustle. It may not be a true, authentic soju–but at least it’s not out there ruining Blaufränkisch and Grüner Veltliner for people.
I poured it into juice glasses and pulled a pepperoni-olive pizza out of the oven. The combo delivered the electric thrill that you can only get from pairing booze and sugar with fat and salt.
Well, that’s a wrap for the 2026 Costco Wine Advent-ure Calendar. I hope I’m not bumming anyone out when I say that this year’s offerings were substantially weaker than the past two years’.
Many of the best wines were thin and same-y. Many of the worst (especially the reds) were nearly undrinkable–enough to turn off sophisticated sippers and new wine drinkers alike.
As a wine explorer and a cheapskate, I really like the idea of getting 24 half-bottles from around the world to taste and share. But due to the lack of quality, variety, and typicity, our verdict for the 2026 calendar is Not Recommended.
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.
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