Not so long ago, any time you mentioned the burgeoning Chinese taste for expensive fine bordeaux, someone would be sure to hoot, “Yes, but don’t they drink it mixed with Coca-Cola?” It used to be true, though it hasn’t been for some time, but I suppose continuing to laugh about it made us all feel better about the fact that the strength of the Asian market was pricing it out of our reach. Well now, guess what? After all that eyeball-rolling, a French company has launched a red wine that is flavoured with… cola. 
 
 Rouge Sucette cola (red lollipop cola) is made from 75 per cent wine with the balance sugar, water and cola flavouring. It’s about 9% abv, is best drunk straight out of the fridge and will be rolled out across France next month. This is the sort of story you might expect to be greeted with cries of “Quel horreur!” But, actually, although this might be the first cola wine, flavoured wine is something the French have already embraced. 
 
 You can also buy passion-fruit flavoured white wines; in France they drank 15 million bottles of flavoured wine last year, and that figure is expected to double in 2013. 
 
 The idea of adding flavouring to wine may seem an abomination to wine snobs, in the same way that certain Michelin chefs have been known to be so enraged when customers ask for ketchup with their dinner that they throw them out of the restaurant. 
 
 But these aren’t fine wines. They are to fine wine as good oven-ready chips are to the thrice-fried restaurant version, so why be precious about it? 
 
 Ten years ago the South African Wine and Spirit Board investigated claims that winemakers had added green pepper essence and pyrazine (a compound found in green tomatoes as well as in sauvignon blanc) to their white wine to make it taste more sauvignon blanc-y. This seemed to me to be more a case of cheating and of breaking the rules than of doing something shocking to the wine. 
 
 Yes, I know, we’re halfway to horsemeat in one sense. But if adding flavouring to ordinary wine were legal as it is for other foodstuffs (such as ice cream) then at the cheap end of the market – where flavour and intensity are hugely compromised by the need for high yields and less care and expensive attention – I’m pretty sure that adding synthetic or natural flavouring would be a routine exercise, the aim being to provide the best-tasting drink at a certain price. And I for one would not be getting het up about it as long as the wine tasted good. 
 
 After all, we already sanction the addition of flavour to wine – in the form of oak. Oak barriques and foudres allow wine to undergo a very gentle process of oxidation. They also add oak taste to a wine – a taste that is adjusted by the winemaker who might choose to use brand new (for strong oak taste) or seasoned barrels, or to char or toast the inside of them to varying degrees. Barrels are too expensive to be used to mature cheap wines – but sometimes the taste of oak is added by sticking a plank of wood or handful of oak chips in the wine tank. This gives the wine a completely different woody flavour to what you would get if you used a barrel. 
 
 Sometimes it seems to rasp and stick out in an unpleasant way that makes me wish the winemaker had just left the wood out of it altogether. But if carefully done it can add a little spice. 
 
 At the moment, flavoured wines in this country tend to play to greed. Example: chocolate-infused wine was introduced onto our supermarket shelves a few Christmases ago to the not-inconsiderable joy of those who think that chocolate is great and wine is great and therefore chocolate and wine together must be double great. I am not a fan. 
 
 Flavouring is not always cynical, though – not always a way to gussy up a not-very-good cheap wine, or create a label people will want to buy even if the wine is not very nice. 
 
 A friend once bought me the most gloriously indulgent red called Oorain Victoria, made in La Clape in the Languedoc from mostly syrah with a bit of grenache – and a splash of maple syrup. This stuff costs about £20 a bottle and had been made by a former technical director of Château Lafite. So it has pedigree as well as authority, showing that not all flavoured wine has to be aimed at the cash-poor, sweet-toothed young adult market. 
 
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 Some might consider the kalimotxo (pronounced cal-ee-MO-cho) a guilty pleasure; I’ve received more than a few skeptical glances when I’ve ordered it at bars in New York. But I don’t feel an iota of contrition when I drink this Basque-country classic. It couldn’t be easier: equal parts red wine (some say the cheaper the better, but that’s up to you) and cola. I like a squeeze of lemon juice for a little brightness, and maybe a slice of lemon or orange to dress it up. But purists might consider even those modest additions a little fussy. The overall effect is surprisingly sangria-esque, minus all that fruit-chopping and waiting, and wonderfully refreshing. 
 
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 If you can find cola made with cane sugar rather than corn syrup, all the better, but the drink is still fine with whatever you’ve got on hand. The soda’s caffeine actually makes the kalimotxo a fine pick-me-up: an ideal afternoon drink when you know you’ve still got a long day, and night, ahead. 
 
 In a glass filled with ice, combine 3 or 4 ounces dry red wine (preferably Spanish) with an equal amount of cola and 1 squeeze lemon juice. Garnish with a lemon or orange slice to serve. 

 Have the French gone crazy? Following close on the heels of Winestar's French wine in a can — and not just plonk, but vintage red, white and rosé from such prestigious appellations as Bordeaux, Burgundy and the Rhone Valley — a French producer is introducing cola-flavored wine. 
 
 Say what? 
 
 Hausmann Famille, a branch of the firm Châteaux en Bordeaux, has introduced Rouge Sucette, a red wine doused with cola flavor targeted for a younger audience. 
 
 PHOTOS: 13 big, bold, juicy red wines 
 
 In France, sad to say wine drinking has plummeted in recent years, particularly among the young, who are more attracted to beer and spirits. A BBC story by Hugh Schofield from Paris explains: “Recent figures merely confirm what has been observed for years, that the number of regular drinkers of wine in France is in freefall.” He wrote that in 1980, “more than half of adults were consuming wine on a near-daily basis. Today that figure has fallen to 17%. Meanwhile, the proportion of French people who never drink wine at all has doubled to 38%.” 
 
 But will a starter wine flavored with cola and playing to a younger generation’s sweet tooth lead to an interest in learning about — and appreciating — their wine heritage? 
 
 Rouge Sucette — “Red Lollipop” — is cheaper than wine. A bottle will cost just under $4 in France and will be sold primarily in hypermarchés (huge supermarkets). How many Red Lollipop drinkers will graduate to something more sophisticated is not yet known. 
 
 PHOTOS: 13 big, bold, juicy red wines 
 
 But I have to say the logic seems flawed. Why not go with your best shot — maybe a pretty little Côtes-du-Rhône or Languedoc rouge at an affordable price? Or how about rosé as a starter wine? 
 
 Now I can’t say for sure what Rouge Sucette tastes like. According to Victoria Moore writing in the British newspaper The Telegraph, it’s “75% wine with the balance sugar, water and cola flavouring.” 
 
 I can’t quite wrap my head around red wine plus cola, though I do see the point of rum and cola. In this case, I’ll take my wine straight and my cola straight. The alcohol is just 9%, so for those seeking a buzz, this is wine light. 
 
 Moore points out that the French have already embraced flavored wines, such as grapefruit-flavored rosé or passion-fruit-flavored whites. In fact, in France, she says, “they drank 15 million bottles of flavored wine last year and that figure is expected to double in 2013.” 
 
 And we thought White Zinfandel was bad. 
 
 Incroyable! 
 
 
 
 ALSO: 
 
 French wine in a can! 
 
 Bellini season: Two ingredients for the perfect summer drink 
 
 Want your red wine to taste better in the heat? Pop it in the fridge 
 
 Twitter: @sirenevirbila 
 
 
 

– 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.)