From the Los Alamos region, this young, firm Pinot wants a little time in the bottle to mellow. Tasted in January, it's unresolved in tannins, fresh acidity, oak (76% new) and primary cherry and raspberry fruit.

Vivid red. Sexy, expansive aromas of raspberry and cherry compote, Asian spices and cola. Sweet and silky in texture, with palate-staining red fruit flavors and sweet oak spiciness. A floral quality comes up with air and lingers on the sappy, very long finish. Quite seductive and surprisingly approachable now.

Very savoury, celery salt, spicy, incense, plum, black cherry, great tea aromas. Rich, ripe, round, supple but very full palate, almost sweet. Tea leaf, spicy, celery salt, vanilla, raspberry, black cherry, light coffee, tobacco leaf and dried herb flavours.

You might expect rich texture and plush fruit from a high-end Kendall-Jackson wine, but you may be surprised by the distinctive character of the fruit here. It's in the savory mode of persimmon - firm, spicy and earthy rather than sweet. An elegant wine for braised partridge or other dark-meated game birds.

It’s impressive for a wine this good to be made in rather large quantities. Deep in color, it has mouthcoating fruit and rich tannins, with minty notes adding to the deep, dark cherry and blackberry flavors. Full-bodied and full-flavored, it relies on fruit concentration rather than overt oak for personality and is smooth in texture. It may come out of its dense phase and be even better by 2016.

This Syrah is so good, it’s crazy to think K-J made 16,000 cases of it and is selling it at this price. It’s dry, tannic and full-bodied, just what you want in a steak-friendly wine, and the amazing flavors range from blackberry and cherry jam through cassis and plums to toast, smoked meat, vanilla, black pepper and dark chocolate.

A brilliant 1,500-case Syrah, the 2007 Highland Estates Syrah Alisos Hills is from a hilltop vineyard with southwest facing slopes. It reveals an inky/purple color, sweet blackberry, graphite, and charcoal notes, dense, full-bodied flavors, and long, sweet tannins in the finish.

Intense and highly ripened blackberry fruit is the driving force right from the start here, and, while the wine is also decked out with lots of sweet oak, so too it is marked by an indelible streak of peppery Syrah spice. It is very full-bodied and a touch viscous to start, but it is more supple in feel than it is heavy or soft, and it persists quite well at the finish. A couple of years in the cellar will see it start to round into shape, but has the pieces in place to improve for many years more.

A rustic and voluptuous red balanced by mouthwatering acidity, this wine grows at K-J's estate vineyard, which rises more than 1,000 feet above sea level. Saline flavors run through it, like salty figs or spiced plums, mellowed by the richness of new oak. Its firm tannins will sustain the wine as it ages.

Tries, with considerable success, to advance the argument that Sonoma is Merlot's natural home. A ripe, rich, plummy wine, with terrific fruit and superb tannins, easy enough to drink tonight or age a few years. It's so good, you can't help but reach for another glass.

Smoky, oaky, blackberry nose. Fruity, complex... velvety in the mouth, black fruits, black pepper and spices, very firm, very high-toned.

"Earth, black fruits, brown spice, chocolate. Supple, sturdy and very well balanced. Aggressive fruit is interwoven with rich, spicy oak that lasts. Surprisingly approachable for its depth." Cellar Selection.

K-J has made a habit over the past three decades of delivering more bang for the buck than most of its competitors. That's as true today as it was 25 years ago. The Grand Reserve is a perfect example. At $26, the 2013 vintage would do well in blind tastings with merlot costing as much as $40. It shows excellent richness and weight on the palate, seductive blueberry and plum fruit, and supple tannins for a smooth ride. Notes of oak spice and wood smoke are restrained and well judged.

This is an impressive undertaking, made from estate vineyards across the region, all certified sustainable. Medium in build and intensity, it allows acidity to balance out the strong, interwoven tannin and power to remain buoyant in high-toned cherry and currant. It finishes with a flourish of cinnamon spice.

Kendall-Jackson's Grand Reserve Merlot proves a point many have been making for years about the merlot grape's potential in Sonoma County, where it is closer to the Pacific and generally cooler than neighboring Napa Valley. Merlot likes cool weather and it shows. This vintage of K-J Grand is dense and rich, with layered black-fruit aromas and a generous helping of sweet oak. It would stand out in any crowd.

The outstanding 2011 Merlot Grand Reserve, a blend of 91.8% Merlot and the rest Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot, comes primarily from Sonoma County’s Trace Ridge, Legacy and Alexander Mountain Estate vineyards. Copious aromas of berries, mocha and chocolate as well as a hint of oak emerge from this full-bodied, opulent Merlot. It should drink well for a decade.

The GR merlot is totally dialed-in at Kendall-Jackson, and the 2010 is one big wine. Look for a rich, spicy, black licorice nose flecked with black cherry, plum, tapenade, cedar, menthol, saddle leather, barnyard and vanilla aromas. Rich, ripe, supple tannins and big extract. Black-cherry jam, plum, cedar, black licorice, peppery, spicy, orange, espresso, sage and herb flavours. A bit warm on the finish, but it has great fruit and complexity. Should improve over the next three to five years.

The 2006 Merlot Howell Mountain is a dense ruby/purple-tinged wine displaying notes of crushed rocks, black raspberries, cherries, and white chocolate.

Taylor Peak is 100 percent Bennett Valley grown fruit that spends 17 months in French oak, of which 37 percent is new. Look for cool black fruit and blueberries with bits of tobacco, spice, compost chocolate and licorice. Impressive styling that focuses on mountain fruit giving it power but with Bordeaux Right Bank-like finesse. You can easily drink this merlot, for a decade. Well done and fine value.

More and more French oak (now 85 percent but only 23 percent new) has really helped to shape the new style of this wine that, while ripe and full-flavoured, is eminently more suited to food. Look for a bright core of plummy, black cherry fruit and mocha notes, with warm cedar, violet and tobacco undercurrents. Highly polished fruit from some impressive sites in Sonoma (85) and Napa (15). Well done.

A serious Merlot. Well-oaked, it shows lots of crowd-pleasing caramel, toast, vanilla and sweet woody flavors, but the fruit, acids and tannins are fully supportive of all that oak. Cherries, black raspberries and mocha flavors are pure and refined, leading to a dry finish.

A first-rate Merlot at a good price for the quality. Dry and complex with a soft, velvety texture, this supple wine features blackberry, red cherry, cocoa and sweet dried herb flowers, finished with toasty oak.

Wonderful Christmas-spice aromas lead to concentrated opulent fruit flavors in this full-bodied, complex and nicely oaky wine that's blended mostly from Syrah and Zinfandel. It's easy to pick out clove, cinnamon and cedar aromas before black currant and black cherry fill the palate.

A big, bold wine that also tastes precise and structured, it has deep, dense fruit flavors like black currant and black cherry, layers of fine tannins, hints of dark chocolate and espresso. This is a great wine to stash in the cellar, as it will taste best after 2020.

Opaque purple. Powerful, expansive aromas of black and blue fruit preserves, vanillin oak and incense, with a spicy quality adding lift. Lush blueberry and cassis flavors show an exotic floral touch and alluring sweetness, with gentle acidity providing shape. Closes smooth and very long, with supple tannins building slowly and folding into the dense fruit. I find this sexy wine quite approachable already.