Last night the Ladies Tasting Society met to blind-taste five red varietals, that is, wines made primarily from, and named after, one grape variety (for example pinot noir or cabernet sauvignon). It was an exciting and highly competitive tasting, since not only did the ladies score ourselves based on how many aspects of the wine we could detect correctly (grape? vintage? French or Californian?), the wine types were also vying with each other to be our favorites of the evening.
 
One lady and one grape prevailed. Click here to find out who and what :
 
Each member brought one example of five red varietals: syrah, pinot noir, cabernet sauvignon, merlot, and zinfandel. We were allowed to bring blends, but the grape in question had to represent at least 70 percent of the mix. Otherwise, the wines could be from anywhere, any vintage, and any price point.
 
Not surprisingly, we picked out the pinots and the zins immediately from the line-up. The former gave itself away with the varietal’s characteristic bright ruby color, silky texture, and vivid cherry flavors. With the latter, zinfandel’s tell-tale garnet shades, slightly viscous mouthfeel, and rich black fruit tastes were its calling cards. Pinot and zin, too, aren’t particularly tannic wines, so their softness on the palate helped us distinguish them from the others.
 
But oh, those others. They really tripped us up.
 
First of all, cabernet and merlot are sister grapes, the cornerstones of the red Bordeaux blend, and often matched up in California too because they complement each other so beautifully. Indeed, our two runner-up favorites of the evening were a 1999 Lynch-Bages from Pauillac (mostly cab, the rest merlot, with a smattering of other Bordeaux varieties) and a 2005 Pride Mountain Merlot (90 percent merlot, the remainder “cab sauv” as they say in the business), textbook French and Californian examples of how, respectively, a burly cabernet can benefit from merlot’s softer influence, and how merlot can gain some structure from a dollop of cab.
 
But boy are they hard to tell apart. Plus we threw one bottle of syrah in the mix, helping to further confuse things. Those of us who know and love syrah tried to single it out by means of the varietal’s prominent smoky, meaty, brambly flavors. But the syrah we were dealing with, it turns out, was from California and showed a purer, fruit-driven profile, so much so that a bunch of us, including yours truly, mistook it for a merlot, a couple even for a zin.
 
At the end of the day, the beautiful Lady Diana took home the crown for the most wines guessed right (she missed on only two varietals!). With an equally gorgeous Howell Mountain cabernet sauvignon from Dunn Vineyards getting “Best of Tasting,” the cabs and merlots generally outdid the other varietals.
 
Best of Tasting
Dunn Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon “Howell Mountain” 2004 ($80) ****1/2
Even as it was pouring, this wine caught everyone’s attention with its deep purple-black color. “A monster! Sexy!” cried one lady. I liked its very distinctive nose, full of camphor, licorice, and smoke, which made me mistake it for a Bordeaux. Serious blackberry, plum, and black cherry flavors, with muscular tannins. Definitely a keeper. (Interestingly, only one of us didn’t peg this as cabernet sauvignon, but a number of us goofed by saying it was Old World.)
 
Best Value
Rex Hill Pinot Noir Willamette Valley ($25) ***1/2
Bright ruby color, with aromas of fresh-picked, ripe red cherries. Some tasters detected a little funk (“car oil,” said one) on the nose, but to me the Rex Hill’s soft mouthfeel with vivid, pure, sweet flavors of cherry, raspberry, and a little chocolate, instantly identified this wine as a pinot.
 
Pride Mountain Merlot 2005 ($46) ****
Set off from the powerful Dunn Howell Mountain by its rounder, more balanced mouthfeel, most of us nailed this as a merlot right away. Pride’s merlot is no shrinking violet, though: rich aromas of cedar, cassis, and black fruit are followed by a delicious, medium-dark wine, with all its parts — cherry, licorice, chocolate, gentle tannins — in perfect balance.

Lynch-Bages, Pauillac 1999 ($90) ****
I detected a little orange around the edges of this wine in my glass, which should have tipped me off that we were dealing with an older vintage. Reserved on the nose but, especially upon second taste, this mostly-cabernet blend from Bordeaux opened up into a plummy, wild-strawberry flavored, deliciously dry wine, with lots of interesting scorched earth and asphalt notes. Great finish, great ride.
 
JC Cellars Syrah “California Cuvée” 2007 ($28) ***1/2
Pretty in purple! We all liked the look and feel of this wine, but not one of us could figure out what it was. Smoky, dark fruit aromas should have led us down the path toward syrah (as should one taster’s declaration, “different!”), but the JC Cellars’ sweet, almost jammy palate full of red fruit flavors, with a touch of cedary vanilla, sent many tasters spinning off base.
 
Château Monbousquet, St. Emilion 2000 ($89) ***1/2
Most controversial was this predominantly-merlot blend from the St. Emilion appellation in Bordeaux. “Tannic and repelling,” said one lady, “fishy” said another. But what some of us found wierd, others found inspiring: “Mocha chocolatay yah-yah!” sang one fan after first sniff; “stinky barnyard, leather shoe, but nice style,” wrote another. Alcoholic and tannic, this merlot has years to go.
 
Haywood Winery Zinfandel “Morning Sun” ($30) ***
Darkly colored, with a big black fruit nose. Intense plum and blackberry flavors, with soft tannins, and a jamminess on the palate that gave way to some pleasant tannins and a nice finish. Almost all of us pegged this Hawyood as a zin.
 
Ridge Zinfandel “East Bench” 2006 ($29) ***
Light-to-medium color, with bright cherry aromas. Big dark cherry flavors, with some anise and pepper notes. But it was a slightly viscous mouthfeel that forced this Ridge zin to show its hand.
 
George Chicotot, Nuits St. George 2006 ($33)
It’s not that we didn’t like this red Burgundy. It just got out-muscled by the Californians and the bruiser Bordeaux in the bunch. Its light, almost rosé-territory color, its fruity-peppery nose, and its delightful strawberry flavors identified it as a pinot — all real red Burgundy is 100 percent pinot noir — but it was as if this featherweight contender stumbled into the wrong ring.