It’s been high time for me to take a break from the steady progression of red blends, so I decided to open a bottle of Otis Kenyon’s newly released merlot.
Great wine. It is everything a merlot should be. It has nice fruit to it – cherry and currant (which I guess is kind of like saying it tastes like grape – go figure). The fruit’s balanced with just the right amount of bitterness. The tannins are a little rough, but not overwhelming. The finish has overtones of oak, pencil shavings and a licorice or anise finish.
This is a really well put together wine. Thanks to the movie “Sideways,” there’s sort of a stigma to liking merlot, but the reality is that it’s an excellent grape with plenty of nuance to it, when it’s put in the right hands. Otis Kenyon has done a great job of capturing a lot of its potential in this wine.
