We Tried Barefoot's New Oreo Thins Wine And Here's How It Went
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Chocolate and wine is a classic (and classy) pairing. Nothing complements a fancy night in like a glass of quality red and some dark chocolate truffles. But who says you have to be snobby to enjoy the combination of cacao and cabernet? For every person ordering a vintage pinot to go with their flourless chocolate gateau at a bougie restaurant, we bet there are dozens slamming a bottle of Barefoot and cramming Oreos into their mouth while sitting pantsless on the couch watching Netflix. Barefoot and Oreo have teamed up to create a product especially for these heroes: Barefoot X Oreo Thins.
Anyone who eats Oreos knows that their flavor (and, unfortunately, their color) lingers in your mouth long after you're done chewing. If you drink wine after eating Oreos, it's going to taste like Oreo-flavored wine. Barefoot X Oreo Thins takes that experience and puts it in a bottle for maximum efficiency, adding Oreo flavor to the wine (Oreo Thins flavor, to be specific). According to a Barefoot press release, the wine "includes flavors of chocolate and cookies and creme along with notes of oak." We'll see about that. At least Barefoot winemaker Jen Wall, who surely knows more about wine than us, seems enthused, saying, "We had such a great time exploring the different flavor combinations." It was fun for her, but will we have fun once this hits our palate?
What's in the box
The box we received contained one bottle of Barefoot X Oreo Thins red blend as well as a package of Oreo Thins. The outside of the box says "Adults only; must be 21+ to open." Just because the wine is Oreo-flavored doesn't mean it's for kids! Barefoot suggests that you consume the two components together. If you're lucky enough to score a box on the open market, the consumer version comes with two bottles of wine.
The label prominently declares that the bottle's contents are "grape wine," as though it feels the need to reassure you that you're not drinking something made out of fermented Oreos. According to Jen Wall, the base is "a blend of our bright, berry-flavored red wine." It seems to not contain any actual Oreos, instead using "natural flavors" to add cookie essence. The wine clocks in at a respectable 13% alcohol by volume, so they're not skimping on the booze here. The back label describes the red blend as "a delicious combination of jammy dark fruit aromas and layers of chocolate, cocoa, and vanilla."
Also included in the box was a little card that described the wine some more and invited you to test your palate by seeing if you could identify the promised notes of chocolate, cookies and creme, oak, blackberry, and dark cherry.
How much does it cost, and where can you buy it?
Barefoot released this product on December 9. It was sold exclusively on a special website they made for the express purpose of selling Barefoot X Oreo Thins. The $24.99 box is comes with two bottles of wine and a package of Oreo Thins, which is a pretty good deal for that much stuff, although regular Barefoot wine goes for around $5 a bottle (via Wine-Searcher), so you're definitely paying extra for novelty.
Sadly, at the time of writing, the website was already sold out. The site is still up, but all it has is a list of suggested Oreo pairings for a selection of regular Barefoot wines. This is a limited-time, limited-production release, so it's not clear if they will ever restock. If you just can't live with the thought of never getting to try this one-of-a-kind vino, you can score some on eBay, but you'd better be prepared to shell out some serious coin. One auction is sitting at almost $200 with several days left. Another seller is trying to charge an eye-watering $1,100 (plus $21.31 shipping) for a full box. Perhaps most outrageously, someone listed just the box with empty bottles for $399.99. In our opinion, almost anything else would be a better use of 400 bucks.
Nutritional information
While Oreo Thins' slimmer proportions and less-sweet taste might make you think they're a lighter option than original Oreos, pound for pound, their nutritional profile is quite similar. Although the nutrition facts for Oreo Thins show that they have slightly fewer calories, carbs, and grams of sugar than regular Oreos do per serving, the serving size for Thins is also slightly smaller. If you eat the same weight of Oreo Thins as you would of regular Oreos, it's about even from a nutritional standpoint.
As we've mentioned before, alcohol manufacturers in the U.S. aren't obligated to provide nutritional information to consumers. Even though wine definitely has calories, sugar, and carbs in it, how much of those things are in Barefoot X Oreo Thins isn't publicly available information. Nutritionix estimates that sweet red wine has about 165 calories, 14 grams of carbs, and 8 grams of sugar per 3.5 ounce glass, but there's no real way of knowing how Barefoot X Oreo Thins measures up.
Oreo Thins taste test
We know you're probably reading this because you're curious about/horrified by the wine, but since the box comes with Oreo Thins as well, we might as well review those too. The press release positions Oreo Thins as the Oreo cookie for adults, which makes sense. Since they're so skinny, they feel more refined and delicate than a regular Oreo. We were surprised to see that not only was the layer of creme filling skimpier than a standard Oreo, but the cookies themselves were thinner as well. While this might leave some snackers feeling unfulfilled, we enjoyed the delicate crunch of the thinner cookie. It reminded us of those fancy European wafers you can find in nice grocery stores.
The flavor profile of Oreo Thins definitely leans in favor of the chocolate wafers over the creme. Overall, they are noticeably less sweet than other kinds of Oreos, with the bitter, slightly salty flavor of the cookie overpowering the creme. We enjoyed this, although it might not be everyone's cup of tea. Crucially, you can still do the Oreo twist to separate the two halves of the cookie, which we think is necessary for any self-respecting Oreo.
What does Barefoot X Oreo Thins taste like?
We went into this taste test fully expecting the Oreo wine to taste nasty, but it's honestly not that bad. The smell is almost uncannily Oreo-like, with the aroma of cocoa powder totally overwhelming any hint of wine. Once you take a sip, it's a different story. "Jammy" is an apt descriptor for the flavor, as the wine hits you over the head with sweet fruitiness when it first touches your tongue. The tasting card might have suggested cherry and blackberry, but it reminded us more of grape jelly.
After the first hit of sweet fruit, you get some of the Oreo taste you expected from the smell. Although we were promised notes of vanilla creme, all we could taste Oreo-wise was the unmistakable bitter cocoa of the wafers. The aftertaste goes back to fruit, with a berrylike sweetness balanced with just a hint of sour. There are no tannins to speak of. We tried this wine on two separate occasions: first at room temperature, and then chilled. If you want to taste the Oreo essence more, we suggest chilling it, as that minimizes the wine flavor and lets the Oreo shine through.
This isn't a flavor observation, but Barefoot X Oreo Thins dyed our mouths a very dark color, darker than normal red wine. Perhaps this was the ghosts of Oreos staining our teeth black?
How do they taste together?
We've tasted the individual components of this combo deal separately, so now it's time to see how they play with each other. The press release strongly encourages you to consume the wine and the cookies together, so they must taste better as a pair than they do separately, right? Is Oreo really "wine's favorite cookie," as the neck of the bottle says? Well, we didn't think so.
As we alluded to earlier, Oreos have a tendency to linger in the mouth, affecting the taste of anything you consume along with them. That meant that when we ate the cookies and drank the wine at the same time, the Oreo Thins swamped the relatively mild Oreo flavor in the wine. Instead of tasting like cheap red wine with Oreo flavoring, it just tasted like cheap red wine. Also, on its own, the Barefoot X Oreo Thins wine is quite sweet, but it's still not nearly as sweet as an actual Oreo. The sweetness of the cookies made the wine taste sour, even slightly astringent in comparison.
Dipping was much more successful. We actually enjoyed the hint of wine flavor that clung to the Oreo Thin we dunked in our glass. Dare we admit that we might have even liked it more than an Oreo dunked in milk? That said, you definitely don't need special Oreo-flavored wine to dunk your cookies in. Any sweet red would probably give you a similar effect.
How does Barefoot X Oreo Thins compare to other Barefoot wines and Oreo products?
Barefoot is known as a fun-loving, informal wine brand, so Barefoot X Oreo Thins definitely falls in their wheelhouse. As winemaker Jen Wall says in the press release for this product, "Barefoot Wine is a brand that stands for fun, flavor, and expressiveness." In our experience, Barefoot wine tends to be on the sweeter side of the spectrum as well, so the dessert flavors in this particular bottle aren't totally out of character. This is still something of a departure from anything the brand has done before, as it's the first cookie-flavored product they've ever made.
This also feels like a new frontier for the Oreo brand. While Oreo is certainly no stranger to cross-promotion, slapping its name onto products like whey protein, iced coffee, and yogurt, we can't find any evidence that they've ever done an alcohol collaboration before. This is truly a pioneering moment in snack history.