The Unexpected Mixer That Turns Cheap Wine Into A Refreshing Drink

Listen, sometimes we're not in a position to choose. Given the choice, would we like to drink fine Chianti, carefully grown and aged with grapes stomped by loving feet? Sure we would. But not everyone is in the position to afford fine wine; sometimes you have to make do with the stuff you might buy at a not-particularly-nice motel and hope for the best. That's why mixers are such a blessing: cheap wine can be boosted with seltzer, lemonade, and ... Gatorade? Wait, really?

Yes, really. Although you might have difficulty finding wine cheap enough to use on something this objectively weird (you can't even cook with cheap wine anymore, let alone drink it), Gatorade has a terrifically mellowing effect on less choice wines. It obviously sweetens it a great deal, while the electrolytes in the Gatorade (which are no replacement for water in terms of hydration) have a way of cancelling out bitter tannins; making it wonderfully smooth, if not exactly complex. It's a little like going to see Emerald Fennell's "Wuthering Heights." It's garish, bordering on sacrilege, but you can't say you're having a bad time while you're there.

It all started when "Hot Ones" alumnus Andrew "Babish" Rea, the popular YouTuber behind "Binging With Babish" and "Basics with Babish," made a video ranking the strangest recipes submitted by his viewers. Some were oddly palatable — Spam Teriyaki, for instance — while others, like the "Snickle" (a Snickers with a pickle), were barely edible. But none left as great an impression as Gatorwine, which consists of, well, Gatorade and wine. Babish's initial incredulity gave way to measured appreciation ("the more I'm drinking it, the more I like it"). By the end of the video, he was belting out Gatorwine-themed covers of "Little Lion Man" and "Sweet Caroline" between sips of the good stuff.

Later, Babish would do an entire video devoted to trying out every flavor of Gatorade to see what made the best Gatorwine, despite the fact that the original recipe specified light blue (aka "Cool Blue" Gatorade). After trying 24 different flavors of Gatorade, Babish determined that the fan who submitted it had the right idea after all. Cool Blue Gatorade was, in fact, the best Gatorwine of the many he tried; with orange coming in at a respectable second.