Saturday Night – Vacation? Part 1

Kathy and I started our Vacation on May 1st with a large dumpster being delivered to our front driveway and got busier from that point on, hence why this Blog post is so late. We spent a good deal of Saturday filling the bin with leftovers from the renos and various other bits and pieces, so our usual Saturday dinner with Mick and Amy was very simple – Burgers and dessert. The burger toppings were laid out buffet style so you could use them for either burger and/or salad.

"The 'do-it-yourself' dinner buffet"

I had a bottle of 1998 Sterling Reserve Merlot which was getting a little long in the tooth so I cracked it open to go with the food. I also had a 2003 Chateau St. Jean Merlot as a ‘backup’ bottle in case we needed more wine with dinner.

"Probably should have drunk this bottle a couple of years ago"

I’ll cover the Sterling Merlot first. The nose on the wine was interesting, Amy described it as “new shower curtain vinyl smell” which after she said it I found myself agreeing with that description. The nose also had dark berry, plum, leather and tobacco aromas to it as well. Tasting the wine you got very subtle fruit to start, a narrow mouth-feel, the balance on the wine was very good but it had a bit of sour finish. This wine was more like a French Merlot then a California Merlot which normally I would like but a more fruit driven Merlot would have been better with the burgers.

"Step One - Open the burger"

Here is the group rating for the wine -Mick – 87, Mark – 88, Kathy – 87, Amy – 87, Overall – 87.25.

Here is what the Wine Spectator had to say about it –

Sterling Merlot Napa Valley Reserve 1998

A solid, chunky style, with tar, blackberry, anise and mineral flavors that are framed by toasty oak. Never really comes into focus, but has concentration and depth. Drink now through 2004. 2,750 cases made. –JL

Rating – 86, Price $70 (US Dollars).

I’m pretty sure that I picked this up at the LCBO for about $70 CDN a number of years ago. The mid-range Sterling Merlot ($30 CDN) at the time was a big favourite of mine so I picked this up to try. I liked the wine but at that $70 price point (CDN or US) it is extremely over-priced and would recommend that people go with something else.

Click here for Part 2.