1999 Dry Creek V. Merlot

[Thomas]

jackl, I think the New World wine industry is, in its infancy, still attempting to figure out its place, mostly unknowingly, for, as in most things, New World people seem to think this is the place for the definitive answer, including wine. You know: we are the greatest democracy, the greatest free world, the greatest car producers, the greatest television producers, the greatest ad infinitum... But, in wine, are we?

During Classical Greece, southern Mediterranean wines ruled, and that followed with Rome, mainly because that is where grapes grew easiest and where the interest in discovery and conquest was more heated. But after the fall of Rome, and then the subsequent fall of the Barbarians, northern Europe developed a thriving commerce--wine included. It was discovered then that northern climate wines seemed more refined; much of that perception had to do with ripeness (or lack thereof). In the north, wines were considered more elegant (less forward and bombastic--a condition of less ripeness) than their southern counterparts.

In the above regard, I am a Middle Ager (passed my personal middle age not too long ago). I feel that wines from cooler northern locales are generally more elegant and nuanced than their southern locale counterparts. There are of course exceptions, but that is always the case, with any subject.