Wine · Medium strength
Merlot
Soft, round, and unfairly maligned — right-bank Bordeaux never apologized.
How to order it: Plum and chocolate, gentle finish. Pétrus is Merlot; the movie was wrong.
Flavor profile
The proper serve
- Serve at 60–65°F
- Bordeaux glass
- Brief decant if young
- Pairs: roast chicken, mushroom, lamb
- Right-bank Bordeaux for the proof
The story
Merlot is the most planted grape in Bordeaux, and on the right bank — Pomerol, Saint-Émilion — it makes some of the most expensive wine on the planet, Pétrus chief among them. The name is widely held to come from merle, the blackbird, supposedly fond of the early-ripening berries. Its softness made it a 1990s American phenomenon, and that ubiquity set up the fall: a single profane line in the 2004 film Sideways sent US sales into a measurable slump, a fate the grape did nothing to deserve. The joke was always on the audience — the bottle the film's hero treasures most, a 1961 Cheval Blanc, contains a healthy share of Merlot.
Adjacent pours