Veenwouden Merlot Reserve 2009

If you’re serious about wine, then you’ve probably had an “a-ha” moment somewhere in your past over a glass of wine.  Whether its the first time you were actually able to pick up a flavour without being told what to taste/smell, or just tasting a wine that for the first time made sense to you.  My moment came just after I finished university and the wine that finally made me realise that there’s few things in life as good as a great wine, was a Veenwouden Merlot.  Vintage 1998 to be exact.  So to say that I have a soft spot for Veenwouden, would be a serious understatement.  I recently discovered the Merlot 1997 on the wine list of the Vineyard Hotel in Newlands at a very reasonable price, and it is still drinking beautifully.  I was ecstatic!

A few days later we tasted the latest vintage of the Merlot (now called Merlot Reserve) – the 2009.  It still has the unbelievable elegance of the older vintages, and Marcel van der Walt (the wine maker) explained to me that he’s always added a drop of Cabernet Sauvignon to add a bit of backbone.  A truly remarkable wine considering that Merlot struggles in South Africa.  The 2009 shows flavours of cherry, raspberry and violets with dark chocolate notes. It retails for roughly R220.

www.veenwouden.co.za