If you’re a baby boomer, your first sip of wine may have been Blue Nun, Mateus Rosé, Reunite or another of those popular mid-20th century wines. Turns out, many of them are still around and their prices are retro, too, with most under 10 bucks. But how do they taste to modern palates? We gathered seven retro wines and found out. Here’s the good, the bad and the egad.

Related Articles ‘Smoke taint’ threatens Monterey County wine grapes

Mount Eden owners take aim at suicide with Tanaka Project

Saratoga community briefs for the week of Sept. 11

Bay Area winemaker Philip Long on 2020: ‘It’s been a rollercoaster’

Chef Michael Mina’s first Wine Country restaurant opening soon Blue Nun ($8.30): Remember the blue habit-clad woman on the Blue Nun bottles? The original 1921 wine was a blend, with muller-thurgau — Germany’s second most widely planted grape — and a splash of riesling, and it was always rather cloying. The blue nun herself is gone from the label and there’s no longer any riesling in the bottle, but the sweet, floral wine with ripe stone fruit notes hasn’t changed much. Blue Nun is now 100 percent muller-thurgau (a grape that has been renamed easier-to-pronounce rivaner). The wine is still cloying on its own, but paired with spicy Thai or Indian dishes, the sweetness balances the burn.

Riunité Lambrusco ($4.30): You may recall the cheesy 1970s jingle, “Riunité on ice, that’s nice.” The product of an Emilia, Italy-based wine cooperative, this fruity, slightly fizzy red wine made its way to the United States in 1967. According to the Wine Industry Network, Riunité was —and continues to be — this country’s most popular Italian red wine. The mildly bubbly, slightly sweet wine is refreshing in a strawberry-soda way. (Try it in sangria.)

For more food and drink coverage

follow us on Flipboard.

Mateus Rosé ($5.50): This fizzy, slightly sweet, Portuguese pink wine garnered quite the celebrity following. Queen Elizabeth was a fan in the 1960s, as was Jimi Hendrix, who was photographed chugging Mateus straight from the distinctive bottle. The bottle’s clear now, but its original green, pot-bellied shape was inspired by military canteens. Today, Mateus is an easy-drinking quaff full of strawberry and watermelon notes. It’s a bit sweet, in a pleasantly refreshing way, thanks to the fizz. We’d serve it well chilled over ice on a hot day. It might work in a boozy watermelon slushy, too. Related Articles ‘Smoke taint’ threatens Monterey County wine grapes

Mount Eden owners take aim at suicide with Tanaka Project

Saratoga community briefs for the week of Sept. 11

Bay Area winemaker Philip Long on 2020: ‘It’s been a rollercoaster’

Chef Michael Mina’s first Wine Country restaurant opening soon

Lancer’s Rosé ($5.50): Portugal’s other famous rosé dates back to the 1940s, when a wine importer began shipping this Jose da Maria Fonesca wine in rust-hued ceramic bottles under the Lancers name. We don’t know what it tasted like back then, but today the wine — a blend of five mostly Portuguese grapes, now bottled in glass, not ceramic — is syrupy sweet. You might try it with something equally sweet, fresh figs, perhaps, or chocolate-raspberry cake, or reduce it to a syrup and drizzle it over ice cream. The bottle carries an admonishment to serve it well chilled. We agree.

André Cold Duck Sweet Sparkling Wine ($4.80): This oddly name bubbly originated in Germany, where wine bottle dregs were mixed with leftover Champagne, lemons and mint, and dubbed kalte ende (cold end) and eventually, kalte ente (cold duck). In 1937, a Detroit winery owner created his own version to sell commercially. Cold duck developed rather a dismal reputation, but more than 2 million cases were sold annually during its 1970s heyday. Modesto-based E&J Gallo Winery owns the André brand now and makes this non-vintage sparkling wine from Concord grapes, capped with a plastic top. The deep purple, sugary-sweet wine may look like grape soda, but its bitter, medicinal flavors taste more like fizzy cough syrup.

2014 Fratelli Bellini Chianti, DOCG Rufina ($13.80): There was a time when every mom-and-pop Italian restaurant had red-checkered tablecloths and candles tucked into the tops of empty Chianti bottles, the raffia-swathed bulbous shapes covered in dripping wax. The wine itself was rough, thin and bitter, the very opposite of today’s high-quality Tuscan sangiovese. The Italian word for flask is fiasco, which seems entirely appropriate here. This wine is tinny, metallic and redolent of shoe polish.

Like our Facebook page for more conversation and news coverage from the Bay Area and beyond.

Martini & Rossi Rosso ($12): Jaclyn Smith’s TV commercial for this wine, filmed during the “Charlie’s Angels” era, is awesome. Rosso is vermouth, a wine fortified with brandy or a neutral spirit is added. Made by Italy’s Martini winery since 1863, the wine today is a blend of trebbiano and catarratto grapes, fruit, herbs and spices. Most of us associate dry vermouth with gin or vodka martinis, but Rosso is sweet and typically sipped straight or over ice as an aperitif. Frankly, you’d need an entire bucket of ice. This strong, tawny spirit smells like Bengay and tastes medicinal. Save this intense herbal concoction for mixing into cocktails instead.