Carolina's Coastal Kitchen

The wine list at Carolina's reads like an afterthought—the kind of selection you'd find at a chain restaurant near an airport. We're looking at a lineup that screams 'corporate distributor's greatest hits' with markup that makes you want to order beer instead.

The list leans heavily on safe California brands—think Kendall-Jackson, Meiomi, and La Crema—with virtually nothing that reflects the restaurant's coastal identity or Gulf location. There's no regional personality, no Gulf Coast producers, and certainly no adventurous picks that would make you excited about wine with your seafood. What's here feels imported from a generic corporate spreadsheet, not curated for a coastal kitchen. The few bottles that venture beyond California seem randomly selected, as if someone checked boxes on a distributor form without tasting anything.

Glass pours appear to follow the same playbook: predictable options at inflated prices. Expect to see Pinot Grigio and Chardonnay in the $12-14 range that retail for $8-10, with zero rotation or seasonal adjustment. The by-the-glass program feels like it was set up three years ago and hasn't been touched since.