What is a Meritage Wine?

Dear readers,

Once again, I have to ask you to bear with me. The good new is that my husband is doing much better. Yipee!

The bad news is that I need to move this blog away from Posterous to WordPress and I’m not very good at it. Posterous was founded by my friend Sachin Agarwal. About a year ago Twitter acquired Posterous – how about that for an exciting event in one’s life??!! Way to go, Sachin!

Twitter has decided to close down Posterous and this is why I’m moving my blog. Please pardon me if it takes me awhile to make the move and get well situated on WordPress.

In the meantime, how do you say Meritage? And what is it?

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What is a Meritage Wine?

Question from Meredith: What is a meritage wine?

Reply: Hi, Meredith. Thanks for writing. A Meritage wine is an American-made (so far), Bordeaux-style blend. And, what’s a Bordeaux blend? It’s a blend made from grapes that come from Bordeaux and these are some very well-known varieties, indeed: Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Malbec, Sauvignon Blanc. And also some varieties that aren’t so well known such as Cabernet Franc, Petit Verdot, Carmenere and Semillon. And, some truly obscure varieties: St. Macaire, Gros Verdot (red) and Muscadelle du Bordolais(white). The producer can make a red Meritage or a white one.

So, those are the permitted varieties for the blend and the blend rule is that it must include at least two of these varieties and no single variety should make up more than 90% of the blend. 

Do we need this complication in our lives? Probably not, but here’s why the Meritage Alliance came about. After the repeal of Prohibition some truly yucky wines with European regional names like Rhine Wine and Chianti were made in the US and offered for sale. This was misleading and the producers of the real thing, in Europe, weren’t too happy. 

Varietal wine, which is wine based on a dominant variety, came into fashion and also became the benchmark for quality wine in the US. The Federal varietal requirement is a minimum of 75% of the grape named on the label.