The Newest Fad: White Merlot
by Bennet and Sheila Bodenstein
Syndicated Wine Columnists
(www.onwine.cc)
Well, they did it again, the sweetheart grape of the 90's wound up as the
zero in 2000. It had happened before and will probably happen again. In the mid
70's red grapes were seen by the experts and vintners alike, as the wave of the
future and many vineyards ripped out their white wine grapes and replanted them
with red. American taste took a sharp and unexpected turn in the 80's, when wine
preferences switched from red to white. There they were, with the right grape at
the wrong time. Once again, out came the red and in went the white. By the time
the white wine grape vines started to bear, it takes five years for a vine to
produce wine quality grapes, blush wines, most notably the white or blush
zinfandel were the rage. Wrong again.
As we approached the 1990's growers took advantage of a problem and tried to
capitalize on it. The problem was philloxera, a small insect (actually it is a
louse) that has a taste for grape vines. It is the same insect that almost put
an end to the French wine industry in the years between 1860 and 1890 by
devastating the vineyards. The insect devours the root systems of grape vines
thereby killing the vine. The solution to the problem was to graft all of the
vines onto philloxera resistant rootstock. The grafting solution worked and
worked well and it became standard procedure of vineyards all over the world to
graft their vines onto philloxera resistant rootstock. All proceeded well for
almost one hundred years until the California branch of the philloxera family
developed a taste for the formerly resistant rootstock. The blight spread like
wildfire. The only answer, when a vineyard gets hit by the little louse, is to
replant on resistant stock.
Taking advantage of the necessity to replant, many growers turned to a variety
that was hyped to be the next "American Favorite," merlot. The farmers
rushed to re-plant with merlot and, when the shortage of the variety occurred in
1994, they were sure they were right and planted even more.
As the old silent movie title would say, "comes the dawn." By 1995,
when the grapes were ready to be made into wine, there was an overabundance of
merlot grapes; by the turn of the century there was a glut.
It took some head scratching and barrel kicking before a workable resolution to
the problem was arrived at. The solution was simple, do the same thing to the
merlot grapes that they did when there was a glut of zinfandel grapes, make them
into blush wine.
That is where we stand now; wineries are gearing up to produce white merlot. The
industry is beginning to leak hints about the new wine. It will be sweet, but
not as sweet as the white zinfandel. It will be fruity but also not as openly
fruity as the white zin. It will even be much more complex than its other blush
counterpart. There are even plans afoot to combine the white merlot with fruit
flavors and do economic battle with the flavored white zinfandels. In plain and
simple words, the producers are gearing up to give white zinfandel a good run
for its money.
The question now is; where will all of this leave the wine drinking public? It
has been traditional that when a person discovers wine they usually discover the
sweet ones first. They then gradually graduate to the drier wines. This new
white merlot, because it will not be as sweet as the white zin, can act as a
stepping-stone into the world of fine wines, which are usually dry. For those
who do not wish to take this step, they have another wine style to choose from
and be happy with. What ever happens, the growers and winemakers are committed
and there will be a good deal of this new wine in the marketplace shortly,
probably by summer.
The next burning question is; "what will the growers pull out next?"
We can only wait and see. Whatever it is, going by their past track record We
are sure that they will make the absolutely wrong choice
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