Grape Variety: Merlot

Colour: Red

Kramer is on a double date with a friend and is in his usual state of barely suppressed paranoia. All the people around the table are being non-committal, the small talk is excruciating and Kramer is one Quixote short of a fully tilted windmill. A waiter comes up to take their drinks order.

KRAMER: I like Merlot. Is Merlot good for you?
Girl 1: I love Merlot
Girl 2: I adore Merlot
Other guy: Merlot is my absolute favourite
WAITER: Sorry, we have no Merlot.

Kramer involuntarily sweeps a wine glass off the table

Seinfeld

Merlot or Merle-ohh is synonymous with soft, plummy, fruity red wines. Its softness and “fleshiness”, combined with its earlier ripening, makes Merlot an ideal grape to blend with the sterner, later-ripening Cabernet Sauvignon. This flexibility has helped to make it one of the most popular red wine varietals in the United States and Chile.

The name comes from the French regional patois word “merlot”, which means “young blackbird” ("merle" is the French word for several kinds of thrushes, including blackbirds); the naming came either because of the grape’s beautiful dark-blue colour, or due to blackbirds’ fondness for grapes.

Merlot thrives in cold soil, particularly ferrous clay. The vine tends to bud early which gives it some risk to cold frost and its thin skin increases its susceptibility to rot. It normally ripens up to two weeks earlier than Cabernet Sauvignon. Water stress is important to the vine with it thriving in well drained soil more so than at base of a slope.

Pruning is a major component to the quality of the wine that is produced. Wine consultant Michel Rolland is a major proponent for reducing the yields of Merlot grapes to improve quality. The age of the vine is also important, with older vines contributing character to the resulting wine.

A characteristic of the Merlot grape is the propensity to quickly over ripen once it hits its initial ripeness level, sometimes in a matter of a few days. There are two schools of thought on the right time to harvest Merlot. The wine makers of Château Pétrus favor early picking to best maintain the wine’s acidity and finesse as well as its potential for ageing. Others, such as Rolland, favour late picking and the added fruit body that comes with a little bit of over-ripeness.

Outside Bordeaux Merlot is a common denizen of the vineyards. Travel down the Dordogne and you come to Bergerac and Luc de Conti. Luc uses Merlot in all four of his red wines. It is 100% of the Classique which is a simple, convivial wine with an expansive, warm nose of wild strawberries and myrtille with smoked notes and spice. Supple in the mouth it has thick juicy fruit reinforcing the aromas found on the nose. La Gloire de Mon Pere is normally an equal blend of Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon, Medoc-style with sweet blackcurrant fruit aromas, cedar/tobacco, smooth vanillin oak on the palate, ripe integrated tannins and terrific finish. Of the two Moulin des Dames reds it is the Anthologia in which the best parcel of Merlot is blend. This shows the grape when it takes the minerality of the terroir.

Merlot is favoured as a varietal in the Languedoc where it ripens easily enough. Domaine des Moulines makes a version which is plummy and soft with notes of coffee and chocolate and a hint of wild herbs. The Nordoc is more on the red fruits, cool fermentation keeps the fruit fresher and the tannins softer.

Merlot is the fifth most planted red variety in Italy, which I find a depressing statistic. Flourishing in Friuli where it makes lively, grassy reds it has also become well established in Tuscany (particularly in Bolgheri) where it combines with Sangiovese and/or Cabernet (or is ,made by itself) and worshipped as a Super-Tuscan. The international grape varieties have taken root throughout Italy, however, as the oenologists look to profile flavours that will be enjoyed or appreciated (so they believe) throughout the world. Merlot is the chocolate nemesis of the winemaker.