The Wine Times

This wine is simply breathtaking. It is the summer wine for white lovers. 100% chardonnay and hailing from Burgundy, with a taste as interesting and uncommon as its marred history.

According to myth, the winemaker purchased a plot of land in Mersault, which is known commonly for its rich, buttery, ripe fruit and exorbitant prices among other things. Yet there happened to be a large hole of some sort in the land. So, doing what any reasonable land-owner would do, he purchased some fill-dirt from a neighboring area and proceeded to fill in the hole.

That’s when the trouble began. France and its equally anal-retentive classification snobs Spain and Italy, have very strict laws dictating how a winemaker is permitted to label their wine. These regional specificities are in most respects a matter of history, tradition, and fair marketing practices. That is, you can’t make a wine in Macon Villages and call it a Mercurey. Yet the French are particularly obsessed with this system of order. So much so, in fact, that simply by filling in his hole with dirt from a neighboring appellation, he was no longer permitted to call it Mersault.

Bad news for him. But good news for the rest of us. Not bearing the name Mersault on the label cuts the price in half, to the $30-$50 range.

This is a positively stunning wine, tasting like few other chardonnays I’ve ever had. Though it does possess some of that buttery richness, it’s also exceedingly bright, full of lime, pear, and an immense amount of honey and honeycomb. It tastes, even, as if he’s snuck some chenin blanc into the mix.

For the price, I give it a solid 92-95 pts.

Not much to say except wow– and not simply because it’s old. In 1992, the Wine Advocate gave it 90 points, and in 1999 Spectator gave it a mere 82. One thing is clear, the ratings are going down over time, and the wine now is largely on its last legs.

Originally I’d purchased two bottles of this in the early 90’s. It was known for its propensity to age well and for a California cab, and I can certainly attest to that. The first bottle I opened about two years ago and the second I opened last night at my favorite local wine bar and restaurant in Raleigh, Enoteca Vin. To be honest, they weren’t much different. Both had a bit of that old bottle must that blows off with a few swirls in-glass.

In spite of its dropping ratings over time due to its sheer age, I found the wine to absolutely wonderful and particularly enlightening. Why? Because they don’t build cabs like this anymore. Even if it isn’t as good as it was in the mid-90’s, tasting this wine will open your eyes to the olden days of California Cab- that is, before they started oaking the life out of it. It drinks much more like a Bordeaux. Though not quite as rich and supple, it shows many of the same characteristics of earth and very mellowed-out fruit, particularly currant and a hint of cedar. Drinking such an old bottle (19 years old at this point) also provides more than ample time for any of the pungent new oak flavors we’re now accustomed to, to relax and sublime. The tannins are still present. Though rather than contributing to the sort of dense, chewy bite that so many of us have come to know and love about California Cab- the kind that will leave you pulling your lips away from your gums with a pair of pliers, they show just enough to give the wine substance and hold it together.

All-in-all. This wine proved to be something of a history lesson, providing a window back into the days when California was producing a very different sort of cab. In fact, this exact bottle is still available from a few online retailers to the very modest tune of $40-$45. There’s no doubt that it’s worth every penny.

This wine received 90 points from Wine Spectator. It earned every one of them. Remember when Paringa’s shiraz first showed up on the market with its 90 point rating? This is what it should have tasted like. It’s 43% Shiraz, 42% Cab, and 15% Merlot, all grown in Australia’s Barossa Valley. The shiraz and cab are obvious right off the bat. The cab lends some of that smooth, silky feel it’s known for in new-world wines, and the shiraz chips in its share of spice, though this mellows out the longer you let it open up. The merlot adds a great, extra-fruity kick up front. Lots of cherry, a little black pepper. New-world red drinkers will certainly appreciate this wine on its own. It’ll pair especially well with light beef dishes.

$12.99

Another winner for sauvignon blanc lovers who enjoy the fruitier side of life. This wine heralds from the Touraine region of the Loire valley, which produces a lot of delicious, affordable sauvignon blanc that in this price range tends to be less austere than its cousins in Sancerre and much less rich than the nearby Pouilly Fume. It’s very tangy and fruit-forward, with quite a bit of grapefruit both on the nose and going down. However, it’s not nearly as acidic and grapefruit-heavy as many of the sauvignon blancs we’ve come to know from New Zealand (and sometimes Australia and South Africa). This may well be due the the fact that it’s tempered with 10% chardonnay. All-in-all, this is a great white table wine, probably best suited to spring and summer. It will pair very well with most fish, light chicken dishes, and summer vegetables. And with Wine Spectator awarding it 89 points, you can rest assured I’m not lying about how good it is.

$9.99

More proof that some of the best deals in wine today are coming out of Spain. Weighing in under $10, this 100% tempranillo (A native grape used in nearly all of Spain’s great wines) is tough to beat when it comes to affordable reds. What’s it got going for it? A brief stint in middle-aged American oak, selection by the famed Spanish wine importer Jorge Ordonez, and origins in La Mancha (think Don Quixote), a region from where many of the country’s top bargains are coming. But how does it taste? Well, it’s garnet in color, smells of black cherries, and is smooth, fruity but dry, and relatively low in acidity. It makes a great summer table wine, but is just as good year round with tomato-based pasta, paella, and light chicken dishes. At this price, you won’t feel so bad about cooking with it, or turning a bottle into Sangria, one of Spain’s other native treats. All I can really say about this wine is that its success is, well…quixotic.