It is truly amazing to me how people find ways to spend money needlessly. Today my wife and I drove to the city of Gainesville here in Florida to do some stuff and decided that while we were there we would also do a bit of shopping at Whole foods or as I have heard it called, Whole Paycheck. The store was beautiful and the espresso was good, I will certainly give them that but the prices were crazy high. Yes, there was a lot of organic food available but as I said, the prices were crazy. Aside from the organic foods, there were also brands that I never heard of before and the ingredients of those brands were no healthier or different than the brands we have all heard of and are available at the average supermarket only they higher priced. It turns out that Whole Foods (Jeff Bezos) wants you to spend a lot of money on basically generic label foods with fancy packages. As one example, I saw Whitehaven, Sauvignon Blanc for $19 but it was available right up the street at Total Wine & More for $15. 
This is just one example and I didn't take the time to remember what the prices for other items were but I do remember them being pretty high. The store was busy and people seemed to be placing items in their cart as if they had never seen those items before or couldn't get the typical name brand items at Wallyworld and for much cheaper. I did find a flavored tea in a can that uses Stevia rather than sugar and it was on sale for $2 as well as today's wine which I paid $28.99 for which it turns out was average price for that wine. Speaking of today's wine though, let's get to today's wine review.
Today I will be doing a review of the 2022 Textbook - Merlot. As I said previously, I spent $28.99 for the wine and the bottle is cork sealed. The wine comes in at 13.6% alcohol and the grapes for the wine according to the back label were "sourced from renowned vineyard sites in the Napa Valley" with one of those vineyards being 30% from Textbook’s sister winery, Markham Vineyards estate properties. According to the tech sheet (see below), the wine is composed of 91% Merlot & 9% Cabernet Sauvignon. The wine also sat for 14 months in 30% new French Oak. As a last note, the Winemaker for this wine is Abi Estrada. Guys, there is one thing that bothers me right from the beginning and that is there are so many reviews out there for this wine and the overwhelming majority are giving out incorrect information so check out the tech sheet at the end of this review and you will see that I indeed have the correct information for you guys.
As far as the label is concerned, while it is sort of on the plain side, I actually liked it. There is nothing flashy about the label but I like the fonts used and their placement as well.
On the nose, I get notes of black plum, blueberry & blackberry. This nose is not shy and is giving off the impression of this wine being (unfortunately) a very fruit forward and perhaps sweetish Merlot.
As far as the palate is concerned, the wine is very concentrated, very juicy and fresh tasting. A fairly big note of blackberry is right up front and really does dominate the wine in general.
Right away I am concerned because the wine is immediately showing itself to be a very simple wine and made from grapes that were exposed to high vineyard temperatures. A sweet...very sweet plum note is here as well and it is doing its best to hurt the wine. The blackberry note is not helping matter much in trying to counter that sweetness and I am getting a rich lushness to the wine that honestly is not to my liking, I do not like sweetish "lush" wines. I feel that a sweet or, lush red wine is a coverup for poor grapes and in this case with the wine being a Merlot, the varietal is capable of displaying so much more than I am getting here. I am getting a slight bit of an alcohol burn on the finish which might burn off after a bit but at just a hair over 13.% alcohol, I don't think it is something I should be experiencing. Aside from this slight burn, the wine is smooth and there are no notes pulling my palate in different directions. There is a nice spice here to the wine and this is a note that really works wonders in assisting the wine forward but not saving it. Bright cherry takes the secondary spot for most pronounced fruit note and it also is very fresh and lively. A background note of very light toasted cedar is presented here as well and I have to say, it does work nicely. 
The wine is very well balanced and yes, eventually the alcohol burn did lessen to where it was acceptable although it never fully disappears. I feel as if I might be picking a leather type note here but the wines big time richness is really dominating the note...every note actually so much so that in the end I feel as if I
am wasting my time mentioning anything else.
So...now that the review is complete it is time to give my final
thoughts on the wine. If you enjoy a Merlot that is bright, fruity, ultra fresh
tasting, rather simple & on the sweeter side, this is your wine. If, on the other hand, you
are looking for a Merlot that is on the drier side and offers up some decent complexity and/or with the possibility of the wine aging and displaying a bit
more notes in the near future, this is not the wine you are looking for. This is a very simple Merlot and meant to drink today at a casual get together with friends who don't know much about wine in general. Having said all of this, on The Desert Wine Guy rating scale, I am giving this wine 87 points, I did not care for it.
For those techy wine lovers, here (https://textbookvineyards.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/2022-TEXTBOOK-Merlot-Napa-Valley-Power-Tech-Sheet.pdf) is the tech sheet for you to enjoy.
The Desert Wine Guy
