Napa's Merryvale Making Great Wines By Darryl Beeson, Cellar Master, The Mansion on Turtle Creek Merryvale has a history of making exemplary wines, capturing the complexity and rich, lusty flavors of Napa's fruit. The following would work nicely, a choice of white or red, with any special dinner you might anticipate. Merryvale, Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley 1997 Price $20 Rating 89 "Arriving to Merryvale in 1998," says winemaker Stephen Test, "I inherited a nice inventory of reds still in barrel. In this Cabernet, you'll find my handprint in the blending, finishing, and bottling. My goal is to make classic, traditional, Old World-style wines with ripe concentrated Napa valley fruit." This full-bodied red wine, though drinkable in the present, is capable of cellaring. It is aromatic and concentrated. This wine is made in a fashion to showcase complexities of flavors, while not being overly harsh, as some cabernets can be. "The blend includes 15% Merlot to help tame tannins (the harsh elements), 1% Cabernet Franc for its leafy aromatic contributions," explains Test, "with 2% Petit Verdot for its intense color and black fruit flavors." 1997 was a bountiful vintage for California, and the wine's 14.5% volume of alcohol demonstrates the year's abundance of sun. The wine saw up to 15 months of aging in French oak barrels. Merryvale, Sauvignon Blanc, Napa Valley, 1998 Price $17 Rating 86 "Harvest in 1998 was very late," says Merryvale winemaker Stephen Test, "but the result was ripe Sauvignon Blanc character of hay and melons. Fermentation took place in French oak barrels, and lees stirring (a technique to add creamy flavors from the dead yeast cells leftover from fermentation) was not used so that the complex and distinctive varietal character would not be obscured." This medium-bodied white wine is rich, almost oily in texture, and has a pleasant crispness with a hint of lemon. The blend contains 20% Semillon, a classic combination with Sauvignon Blanc. This wine shows subtle complexity, and will pair nicely with almost any kind of food. Many prefer the Merryvale's style of Sauvignon Blanc with delicately spiced cuisine, as opposed to white wines with the dominant flavors of oak. Merryvale's facility and tasting room is located at 1000 Main St. (Highway 29) in the Napa Valley town of St. Helena (pronounced "hel-lean-ah"). Next door is the popular Italian restaurant, Tra Vigne. For more information, visit their web site at www.merryvale.com. Merryvale also makes what they describe as an "uptown muscatel", called Antigua, made with the Muscat de Frontignan grape and fortified with high quality pot-still brandy. Aged for years in wood, like a good whisky or brandy, this dessert wine is silky smooth with nutty character, as well as nice hints of orange peel aromas. Long a favorite in the Merryvale tasting room, this wine now in broad distribution. For more great "Wine Guy" suggestions, click here Darryl Beeson, in addition to his duties overseeing the Wine Spectator "Grand Award" wine cellar at the Mansion on Turtle Creek, can be heard weekly as the "Wine Guy", in Dallas, on the James Beard Award nominated KRLD-CBS RADIO1080 "Restaurant Show with Jim White", Sundays from noon until 2pm; and in Denver, on ABC RADIO630-KHOW 's "The Gabby Gourmet" program, Saturdays in the 2:00 PM hour. Do you have any questions, comments or suggestions? Email: jwdineline@aol.com Copyright © 1998 Inter Active Media Solutions. All Rights Reserved. The interactive components of this site require that you use a current browser version of Explorer; be sure to maximize your window out so you can see the entire page. This page was created by Inter Active Media Solutions.