I have to agree with my buddy and Wine Enthusiast colleague, Paul Gregutt, when he says that most California Merlot priced between $6-$8 is “just watery plonk.”

That’s from Paul’s Seattle Times column yesterday. Now, Paul takes seriously his job of promoting Washington State wines, often to the detriment of California wines (although he loves hanging out here during Washington’s evil winters, and why wouldn’t a grape like our climate?). In the same way, I feel obligated to defend California wines as among the world’s best. Washington State does produce some pretty good wines. I don’t get the chance to drink them a lot, but whenever I’m up there, if Paul’s around he treats me to treasures from his cellar.

But he’s right about cheap California Merlot. I’ve tasted about 200 Merlots at all price points this year. Of those, I scored around one-third 85 points or less. Now, that’s a “good” wine, by Wine Enthusiast’s definition, but it’s not really one you’d want to be stuck with over a nice meal, especially when the price is $30, $49, $56, as some of these were. Granted, none were as awful as the one I found undrinkable, which will be unidentified, except here’s the review: A horrible wine. Smells like rotting garbage, tastes like cough medicine. Even at seven bucks, it was a total ripoff. Something obviously went tragically wrong with that wine, but we can’t hold it against Merlot, the variety, when somebody starts with crappy grapes and then makes a crappy wine.

More typical of Paul’s “watery plonk” Merlots was this one, which I scored 81 points: Raw and harsh in green tannins, with bubblegum and raspberry sour candy flavors. The problem with the tannins in Merlot is that, unless they’re really fine, they stick out like a sore thumb, and rob Merlot of the velvety, sexy mouthfeel it should have. (I love Hugh Johnson’s characterization of Pomerol as “fleshy and delicious.”) When the tannins are off, so is everything else.

I will identify a typical 86 point Merlot I reviewed because, while the score isn’t all that high, it’s only $11, and I gave it an Editor’s Choice special designation: the Greystone 2009, also with a California appellation. Here’s my review: Softly delicate and dry, this affordable Merlot has lots of charm. It’s a smooth, medium-bodied wine with pleasant cherry, cola, pepper and sandalwood flavors.

Not a bad description, if I do say so myself!

Paul, however, misses the boat when he paints all of California with the same brush, arguing that “the state can’t seem to find a handle on what Merlot is, or should taste like.” He can’t have access to the best Cali Merlots, the way I do, but if he could, he’d understand that there is a California Merlot style at the high end, as exemplified by Rutherford Hill, Keenan, Duckhorn, Turnbull, Hall, Pride Mountain, Shafer, Jarvis, Yates Family, Kennefick Ranch, Carter and others, all of which have Napa Valley AVAs or sub-AVAs (except for the Pride Mountain, which is Napa-Sonoma, and the Carter, which is Napa-Carneros). These wines are rich, dense and deeply flavored, soft and lush in the mouth, and stuffed with jam fruit and cedar flavors, often enriched with cocoa. They are distinguished from their brother, Cabernet Sauvignon, by gentler tannins. They are, pace Hugh Johnson, fleshy. Wouldn’t it be great to stage a blind tasting of some of these against some of Paul’s Washington faves, such as Leonetti, L’Ecole, Quilceda Creek, Chateau Ste. Michelle, Sineann and Northstar?

By the way, the highest scoring Merlot I ever reviewed was Chateau St. Jean’s 2005 Reserve, which I gave 96 points. It cost $90, the second priciest ever, after a $100 Blankiet 2004 (95 points). Those are serious, seriously good Merlots. I think even Paul Gregutt would like them.

Apparently, Merlot is “back.” That’s what Bloomberg News’s Ryan Flinn (my friend and a fellow Oaklander) says in this online article, which has the wine “rebounding” after its Sideways debacle.

I did not know that, but then, there are lots of things I don’t know. So I decided to do a little research and see if Merlot really is rebounding.

The statement that got me was, “California winemakers say sales of upscale merlots are rising. And, after four years of declines, new acreage devoted to the grape almost tripled in 2009.”

I went to my “California Grape Acreage Report, 2009 Crop” (the most recent available from the Calfornia Dept. of Food and Agriculture): In 2009 there were 46,229 acres of Merlot in California (bearing and non-bearing). In 2008 there were 47,263 acres. In 2007 there were 49,781 acres. In 2006 there were 53,384 acres. So what’s this “new acreage devoted to the grape almost tripled in 2009.”?

Nor did non-bearing acreage increase in 2009 over previous years. (The Dept. of Food and Agriculture considers vines under 3 years of age to be non-bearing.) I won’t bore you with the numbers, but in 2009 there were actually fewer non-bearing acres of Merlot than in 2008, 2007 or 2006. So I called Ryan and asked how he got the “almost tripled” statistic.

He said he got it because in 2008 there were 57 new acres of Merlot planted in California, and in 2009 the number of new acres had risen to 158. So it was technically true that from 2008 to 2009 the number of new acres of Merlot “almost tripled.”

But consider a few more facts. In 2006, the number of new acres of Merlot was 449–way more than 2009’s 158, which was the lowest number of acres of new Merlot of the entire decade (except for 2008). So 2009 did not represent some new era of Merlot installation. It was just a few more vineyards.

And consider, also, that 2009’s 158 new acres represented about .03% of the total number of acres of Merlot in California. That hardly seems indicative of a rebound.

Finally, where were those new Merlot vines planted? In order, by county: San Luis Obispo, San Joaquin, Napa (49 acres), Mendocino, Sonoma and Alameda (!!). The problems here are obvious. There may be some decent new plantings of Merlot coming online, here and there, but not enough to make the slightest different in the overall market.

I don’t blame the winemakers Ryan interviewed for talking Merlot up. They included Philippe Melka, Janet Trefethen, Jeff Smith (Hourglass) and Doug Shafer. They all make great Merlots. But of course they’re going to say positive things about it when a reporter asks them.

I think the truth about the state of Merlot was more accurately expressed by Christian Moueix, in an interview in the Jan. 31, 2011 issue of Sommelier Journal. “The fame of Merlot was partly destroyed by that stupid movie Sideways…Petrus was not directly affected by that movie, but my basic Merlot that I used to sell in the States–about 1 million cases all told–was almost destroyed…”.

There are difficulties with Merlot, more so than with any of the other Bordeaux red varieties. Give it too much heat, and the wine turns heavy and dull. Not enough heat, and it’s thin and harsh. It seems to like clay soils, which are not found everywhere in California, especially in the mountains and hills. In my experience, more serious winemakers are eliminating Merlot from their Cabernet Sauvignons and Bordeaux blends, relying more on Petit Verdot and Cabernet Franc.

Yes, there will always be great Merlots and popular ones on restaurant wine lists, but I have to respectfully disagree with Ryan. I don’t think Merlot is on the rebound. It had its day in the sun. It may still be the third-most consumed variety in America (after Cabernet and Chardonnay), but I’ll bet a lot of that Merlot is in boxes and jugs, and was grown in the Central Valley.

Richard Sanford and I spent the morning tasting and talking about the Santa Rita Hills and his fabled career. Lest you know him only for his Alma Rosa Pinot Noirs, particularly from his La Encantada Vineyard, his twin white Pinots — Gris and Blanc — with their natural crispness — are worthy of your attention. The latter is rich, the former sleek as a Brancusi swirl of steel. More on Richard at another time.

From there my friend Sao Anash whisked me up to Bien Nacido where four fabulous chefs — Matt and Jeff Nichols, Frank Ostini and Rick Manson — prepared a Santa Maria-style barbecue to put all previous barbecues I’ve even seen to utter shame. Bien Nacido’s Miller family were my hosts, and my gladness was diminished only by the absence of Nicholas, the “face” of Bien Nacido Vineyard and someone whose joy in life is infectious. After lunch it was back down to Los Olivos for a visit and tasting with a winery I’ve followed for a long time, owned by one of the premier wine families of the Santa Ynez Valley, Gainey. It is about this tasting I want to concentrate in today’s blog.

I’ve given quite high scores for many years to Gainey’s wines, and the barrel samples they offered me certainly didn’t disappoint and in fact raised the bar higher. We went through various samples of block-sourced 2009 Chardonnays that did and did not go through the malolactic fermentation. If you’ve never had that exercise, do so. Here’s a non-ML that’s so crisp and savory in fruit it makes your mouth water. Then there’s the ML version and, as I said, almost apologetically, “I know we’re not supposed to say the word ‘buttered popcorn’ but…”. They smiled. A touch of that movie theater treat is great; too much would be a disaster. But Gainey has seldom if ever been guilty of “too much” of anything, or “too little” either.

It was the 2009 Pinot Noir clonal tasting that excited me and, to be blunt, challenged me. Usually I grill winemakers. This time it was the other way around, courtesy of one of Gainey’s longtime winemakers, and a person I decided I liked way back when I first met him, Kirby Anderson. The four clones we went through were Pommard, Swan, 667 and 114. (Well, I guess technically the first two would be called “selections,” not clones.) Kirby made me explain my impressions of each. My spiel went something like this:
“From left to right [i.e., Pommard to 114], we went from fruitier and lighter to denser, more full-bodied and weightier.”

Kirby: “Right. What fruits did you find in the 114?”

Steve: “No fruit, in fact. I wrote: ‘tannic, beetroot, dry, sassafras.’”

Kirby: “Very good. The 114 is earthy.”

Steve: “That’s what I meant by ‘beetroot.’”

Kirby: “What else?”

Steve: “The Pommard was all cranberry-cherry. Also very spicy. The Swan reminds me of Russian River: cherries, cola, raspberry. The 667 is deeper black cherries, with greater structure.”

Kirby: “And overall?”

Steve: “None of them is complete in itself.”

Kirby: “Mix the Pommard with the 114.”

I did so, and said, “A more complete wine. Fuller, richer. But still, something missing.”

Kirby: “Add a splash of Swan.”

I did, and said, “The most complete wine yet. Very nice. But still, something missing.”

Kirby: “What’s missing?”

I thought. The middle was a little hollow, and the wine, good as it was, trailed off to a quick finish. I said so, and Kirby said, “Good. So what is it missing? How would you fix that?”

I thought. What’s he driving at? Does he mean it needs a splash of Swan? Or some other clone? My mind went blank. In such circumstances, with others around the table watching the wine critic suddenly being critiqued, there was dead silence. Of course, all you can do is be honest — transparent, in our current vernacular — and admit bafflement.

“I don’t know, Kirby,” I said. “You’re the winemaker. You tell me.”

“Oak!” Kirby beamed, triumphantly. He’s got great twinkly eyes and a dazzling smile but now his eyes were twinklier, his smile more dazzling than ever.

I had thought he was asking me how to fatten and length the barrel sample through the addition of other samples, but of course he was entirely right. The wine needs the 8 or 10 months of partially new oak barrel aging that will complete it. I just hadn’t been thinking “outside the envelope” or, as it were, beyond the table. I asked Kirby to tell me 4 things that oak barrel aging does to Pinot Noir to make it better. Kirby gave me five:

- texture
- richness
- structure
- weight
- length

I’ll say one more thing about the Gainey tasting. They know that, with rare exceptions, I have never liked Santa Barbara Cabernet Sauvignon from anyone (although I’ve been praising Gainey’s Merlot since the 1990s; Merlot doesn’t need as warm a temperature to ripen as Cabernet). But this time they had a bunch of barrel samples of Cab and they also had assembled their entire Cab team around the table: John Engelskirger (the longtime Napa vet who consults for them), viticulturalist Jeff Newton, and their Cabernet winemaker, young Jeff Lebard. And, of course, Dan Gainey was there. Hmm, I thought, this could be ugly. If I have to complain about the Santa Barbara veggies, it will be embarrassing to everybody.

Well, I didn’t. The clone 337 and clone 15 Cabernets were very fruity and rich, not a trace of veg. Then they gave me a barrel sample of a blend of ‘09 Cab and Petite Verdot. I swirled, sniffed, tasted, repeated, repeated a third time, and looked up. All eyes were upon me.

“This is, quite simply, the best Santa Barbara Bordeaux-style red wine I’ve ever had,” I said. They told me it will be even better when they’re finished with it, after probably adding Merlot (a no-brainer) and maybe some Cabernet Franc, then aging it for 16-18 months in 50% new oak.

Lots of things can happen between cup and lip, so we’ll see. But the 2009 Gainey, which will probably have a proprietary name, is a wine I hope I’m going to be able to review someday.

But then it was on to dinner, another barbecue, this time up at Fess Parker with two of my favorite Santa Barbara people, Eli and Ashley Parker, who had another trio of chefs — Joanne and Eddie Plemmons and Kevin Hyland — pile on an incredible, amazing, unbelievable table of grilled chicken, tri-tip, you name it. I’ll be writing all about Santa Maria-style barbecue in an upcoming issue of Wine Enthusiast.

Congratulations to Calistoga!

It’s been a long and messy haul but Calistoga finally was granted full AVA status by our friends at the Tax and Trade Bureau. As the article in the St. Helena Star points out, this is a win for all the Calistoga wineries and a big lose for the two wineries that used the word “Calistoga” in their brand names and hoped to prevent everyone else from showing where the grapes are really grown.

The original application for a Calistoga AVA was filed by Chateau Montelena in September, 2006. Initially, it seemed like it would sail through without a hitch. I wrote at the time, “Napa Valley could have a new appellation in as little as a year from now, with the likely approval by the Federal government of a Calistoga American Viticultural Area.”

But that was before the two wineries, Calistoga Cellars and Calistoga Estate Vineyards — neither of which was actually located in Calistoga — challenged the application. Once the lawyers got involved, everything ground to a halt. A year later, in September, 2007, TTB spokesperson Art Resnick, explaining that the agency temporarily suspended consideration of all applications for new AVAs, told me, “TTB needs to take a second look” at the Calistoga brouhaha.

Well, this at least is one wine story with a happy ending. Calistoga now joins its sister communes along Highway 29 — Yountville, Oakville, Rutherford and St. Helena — to make it an even five “jewels in the crown,” just like in the Médoc. (Oak Knoll, you have your work cut out.)

Congratulations to Cambria!

Cambria’s 2006 Julia’s Vineyard Pinot Noir is Wine Enthusiast’s 2009 Wine of the Year, and I’m happy to say I reviewed that wine and gave it its score of 93 points.

When I first tasted the wine, on Sept. 20, 2008 in a flight of other Pinot Noirs, I was immediately dumbstruck by how good it was. “Picture-perfect cool climate,” I wrote of the Santa Maria-grown wine, “absolutely dry and silky, with complex flavors of cherries, Mandarin orange, cola, pomegranates, licorice and cinnamon spice, made even richer by smoky oak.” A few sips later, I added, “Just lovely, and gets even better as it breathes in the glass.” There aren’t that many wines I taste that I linger over, but this one forced me to. When I took note of the price — $21 — I had to gush, “This is the best Pinot Noir at this price on the market.”

Just shows to go that you don’t have to pay an arm and a leg for great California wine.

Congratulations to Merlot!

I was never a Merlot basher, like Miles from Sideways. Not that I didn’t call a spade a spade; Merlots, particularly from the 1990s, could be boring and muddy. But I always hoped California vintners would find their footing with this finicky variety, which is much harder to get right than Cabernet Sauvignon.

So I was glad to read this article in the San Francisco Chronicle (reprinted from the St. Helena Star) that praised Merlot for finally “showing its true nature in Napa Valley.” Sonoma County, too, I might add; it’s not just Napa that can make great Merlot. I would describe Merlot’s Napa-Sonoma nature as slightly softer and red-fruitier than Cabernet and more floral — violets, anyone? — and, at its best, decadent. Here are some of the best Merlots I’ve had lately, with their appellations: Duckhorn 2006 (Napa Valley), Kendall-Jackson 2006 Highland Estates Napa Mountain (Howell Mountain), Pride Mountain 2006 Vintner Select Cuvée (Sonoma County), Chalk Hill 2006 Estate (Chalk Hill), Whitehall Lane 2006 (Napa Valley), Switchback Ridge 2006 Peterson Family Vineyard (Napa Valley) and Wente 2006 Small Lot (Arroyo Seco). It was a pleasure seeing a return to form from Wente, now under the able leadership of fifth-generation Karl, so congrats to Wente, too.

Karl, a good-looking dude