Enormously concentrated smelling of smoke and coffee and tasting of chocolate and black cherry. An extreme wine that swings for the fences. A long toasty finish brings the oak flavors back for an encore. Tannic and young enough to start drinking in 199 6000 cases made.

Beringer continues to do everything right. Its staff of talented professionals may rank as the best in the business. Beringer's Merlot from the Bancroft Vineyard on Howell Mountain is one of the top three or four California Merlots. The nearly outstanding 1989 Merlot-Bancroft Vineyard is a big rich chocolatey toffee-scented wine that displays considerable evidence of aging in toasty new oak. A full-bodied fleshy wine it is a terrific example from this irregular vintage. It matches the intensity of the 1990.