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Red
750ml
Bottle: $18.08
12 bottles: $17.72
COLOR: Wine of very elegant red color. BOUQUET: Intense aroma, with fruity hints of ripe plums, cherry jam and notes...
Red
375ml
Bottle: $13.22
12 bottles: $12.96
This wine impresses red wine lovers immediately with spicy aromas of cassis, black cherry, plum, vanilla, oak and...
Sale
Red
750ml
Bottle: $16.94 $18.33
12 bottles: $16.63
Lively lavender aromas elevate the dark berry and thyme scents on the nose of this bottling. The core of blueberry...
WE
90
Case only
Red
750ml - Case of 12
Bottle: $68.93
Deep garnet-purple in color, the 2021 Merlot bursts with notes of baked black plums, boysenberry preserves, and black...
12 FREE
JS
92
WA
91
Red
750ml
Bottle: $19.88
12 bottles: $19.48
Intricate aromas and flavors of plum and dark berry fruit, with a rich, plush mouthfeel and soft, refined tannins....
Rapid Ship
Red
750ml
Bottle: $9.94
This full-bodied, hardy red maintains an element of freshness throughout. An underlying herbaceous and earthy tone...
WE
88
Red
750ml
Bottle: $21.94
12 bottles: $21.50
12 FREE
Sale
Red
750ml
Bottle: $15.38 $17.09
12 bottles: $15.05
Vivid ruby. Cherry, cassis and succulent herbs on the fragrant nose, joined by a slowly building tobacco nuance....
Red
750ml
Bottle: $28.57
12 bottles: $28.00
Planting a forest one bottle at a time. Browne Family Vineyards is honored to partner with One Tree Planted....
12 FREE
Sale
Red
750ml
Bottle: $23.94 $25.20
12 bottles: $22.80
A wine that is full expression of the potential of Apulian nature, the Rosso dei Vespa combines the traditional...
Sale
Red
750ml
Bottle: $14.94 $16.25
This is a balanced, drink-me-now Merlot ideal for casual consumption. Find notes of fresh cedar, black cherry, plum...
WE
89
Sale
Red
750ml
Bottle: $12.87 $14.30
12 bottles: $11.40
Merlot is like that ol’ pick-up truck of mine. Dependable. A real worker. Just jump in and start it up. It never...
Sale
Red
750ml
Bottle: $12.43 $13.87
Broad, ripe black fruit and spice aromas, with notes of pepper, toasty vanilla and Mediterranean scrub. On the...
Sale
Red
750ml
Bottle: $31.75 $35.28
12 bottles: $25.08
Captivating violet and rose petal aromas lead to fresh, light blackberry and black cherry flavors on a texture of...
WE
90
White
750ml
Bottle: $15.41
12 bottles: $15.10
Certified HVE3*. Sourced from 40-year-old Muscadet vines planted in shallow soils of disintegrated mica/schist....
Red
750ml
Bottle: $11.70
12 bottles: $11.47
This 100% Merlot from Bordeaux combines charm and roundness, offering a nose with a complex bouquet, with red and...
Red
750ml
Bottle: $17.28
12 bottles: $16.93
Sale
Red
750ml
Bottle: $31.32 $34.80
93-95 The 2021 Laroque is a standout. Bright and racy, with tremendous persistence, Laroque stakes its claim as...
WA
95
VM
95
Red
750ml
Bottle: $23.25
12 bottles: $22.79
This delicious and well-balanced Seven Ranchlands Merlot wine will go great with medium-bodied fare from spaghetti to...
12 FREE
Red
750ml
Bottle: $16.75
6 bottles: $16.42
Showcasing the very best of Washington State Merlot, this bold wine has aromas of blueberry and marionberry with a...

Melon de Bourgogne Merlot Primitivo 2021

One of the more unusual French grape varietals, Melon de Bourgogne has been grown in and around the Loire Valley for several hundred years. In fact, this grape was first planted in the Loire region of Pays Nantais back in the mid 17th century, after a devastating frost decimated most of the red grapes which were typical in the area. The winemakers of Pays Nantais were keen to cultivate vines which were hardy, high yielding, and capable of surviving another such frost, and so turned their attention to Melon de Bourgogne for this very reason. The native home of the varietal is actually in Burgundy, where it is still grown to a lesser extent.


Because Melon de Bourgogne produces naturally heavy yields, the vintners of Pays Nantais go to great lengths to reduce the amount of fruit the vines bear. This allows the finest characteristics of the grape to come forward, and also opens up the opportunity for it to express the wonderful granite and schist soils in which the vines are grown. Melon de Bourgogne is a minerally white wine grape varietal, with a very subtle set of fruit flavors. It is prized for its freshness and brightness, and is seeing a revival in the twenty first century as an excellent wine for pairing with a wide range of foods.

With its dark blue colored fruits and high juice content, Merlot varietal grapes have long been a favorite of wine producers around the globe, with it being found in vineyards across Europe, the Americas and elsewhere in the New World. One of the distinguishing features of Merlot grapes is the fact that they have a relatively low tannin content and an exceptionally soft and fleshy character, meaning they are capable of producing incredibly rounded and mellow wines. This mellowness is balanced with plenty of flavor, however, and has made Merlot grapes the varietal of choice for softening other, more astringent and tannin-heavy wines, often resulting in truly exceptional produce. Merlot is regarded as one of the key 'Bordeaux' varietals for precisely this reason; when combined with the drier Cabernet Sauvignon, it is capable of blending beautifully to produce some of the finest wines available in the world.

As with many European grape varietals, there is some debate regarding the precise origins of the Primitivo grape. Most people now agree that it probably came from Croatia, where it is still used widely in the production of red wine, and it known as Tribidrag. However, today it is a grape most commonly associated with the powerful red wines of Puglia, the heel of Italy’s boot, where the intense sunshine and brisk Mediterranean breezes produce grapes of remarkable character and balance. Primitivo is a dark grape, known for producing intense, inky, highly tannic wines, most notably the naturally sweet Dolce Naturale and the heavy and complex Primitivo di Manduria wines. Primitivo tends to be naturally very high in both tannin and alcohol, making it ideal for both barrel and cellar ageing, which brings out its more rounded and interesting features.


Primitivo is not the easiest grape to grow or manage, and it has had something of a difficult century. Indeed, by the 1990s, there was little interest in Puglian wines in general, and winemakers were neglecting their Primitivo vineyards and looking to other, more commercially viable varietals. However, the last decade has seen this grape come well and truly back into fashion, with new techniques and a heightened interest in native Italian grape varietals bringing Primitivo back into the spotlight. It is now widely loved for its intensity and ability to be paired with strongly flavored foods.