Premium New Zealand Chardonnays

New Zealand Chardonnay is nothing like Australian Chardonnay. A closer comparison could be made with Napa Valley, although this is hard as well, as there are so many different styles in both regions. In general,  premium New Zealand Chardonnay is often quite rich (get away from the Sauvignon Blanc image?), and flavours are often stone fruit based as opposed to the citrus profile of the majority of Australian Chardonnay. The other day, I tasted four interesting examples. 

  

The first wine was the 2021 Tony Bish Skeetfield Chardonnay from Hawkes Bay. Tony Bish is a leading figure of the area, known for modern experimentation. He is biodynamic, likes ceramic eggs, you get the picture. 60% new French oak is applied as well. This Chardonnay is opulent and rich, with yellow peach and buttery flavours, and a creamy mouthfeel. No doubt he uses 100% malolactic fermentation. Despite this richness, this wine achieves some elegance on top of its mild acidity (94 points).                                                                                                                                                                                                                                The second Chardonnay is the 2021 Church Road Tom Chardonnay, also from Hawkes Bay. Wow! This wine makes an entry. It is incredibly smoky on the nose - a huge salvo of gun powder. On the palate, it is not different. This is another very opulent wine. It was not clear if the gun powder flavours are the result of the oak treatment or sulphur. It did not change in the glass. Would the smoke reduce with age? Hard to say. I have never tasted a wine as flinty as this. Below the flint, there is some banana and cream, but it is not what this wine is about (90 points).

The third wine is the 2020 Pyramid Valley Chardonnay from North Canterbury. The original international owners settled on this special location after a 15 year search in 2000. The vineyard they planted is at high altitude, very rocky, with vines planted in groups on the site. 

However, this wine comes from three vineyards going back to 1982 (the oldest Chardonnay vineyard in the country). The wine has been on lees for a full year and is matured in 25% new oak.

This is a very balanced wine, with floral aromatics and honeysuckle flavours building an attractive mouthfeel. The wine is quite ripe, yet retains freshness. The creamy aspects are due to the winemaking and lead to a rounded texture. Saline acidity delivers a lifting finish (94 points).

The final wine in this line-up is the 2013 Neudorf Moutere Chardonnay from Nelson. This is a tropical and rich wine, quite oily and buttery. The wine is complex, with stone fruits, such as mango and peach complimented by hazelnut and biscuit flavours. The wine still feels quite young after 11 years. I found there was a bit too much going on in this compote of flavours (92 points).                                                                                                                                                                                             Overall, these wines provided a fascinating mix of flavours and techniques.

 

     

 

New Zealand Chardonnay

 No grape variety in New Zealand can match Sauvignon Blanc by volume, but when we talk quality, it is a different story. Here are four New Zealand Chardonnays from excellent producers.

Kumeu River, from the unlikely Auckland region, has been making outstanding Chardonnays for many years. The 2022 Kumeu River Hunting Hill Chardonnay is continuing this 'tradition'. The wine delivers an elegant mouthfeel with a palate of stone fruit, melon, and peach. This wine delivers an excellent blend between body and acidity (95/++ points).

The 2022 Felton Road Block 2 Chardonnay has a lighter texture, very fine, with excellent oak integration. The finish is very long (95/++ points).

Quite expensive is the 2018 Bell Hill Chardonnay from North Canterbury. It is very interesting on the palate: Green apple fruit mixed with herbal and grassy notes. It is interesting, but not quite my favourite taste (94/+ points).  

I was a bit disappointed with the 2022 Neudorf Rosie's Block Amphora Chardonnay. The fruit profile is similar to the Kumeu River, but the wine is less precise, and the finish a little bland (91/0 points).

New Zealands Current Best?

I recently tasted a number of New Zealand's best wines at the 'Family of Twelve' tastings. This a a marketing organization of some of New Zealand's small and medium sized wineries.

The top wine for me was the 2016 Ata Rangi Pinot Noir. This wine is quite steely, and a bit edgy. It has an ethereal texture with very fine and silky tannins and an expanding finish. Ata Rangi seems to be able to produce this character year after year. Is it due to the clone they stole from Romanée-Conti? Maybe it is. The 2013 Ata Rangi McCrone Pinot Noir is made from the Dijon clone and does not come near it. But also, the vines for this wine are a lot younger.

The surprise second best wine for me was the 2015 Neudorf Moutere Pinot Noir. I enjoyed its deep fruit set, and again an elegant, silky structure.

In third place came the 2017 Felton Road Cornish Point Pinot Noir. The dark cherry flavours were quite smooth, and the tannins silky, a bit bigger than the previous wines. In contrast, the 2017 Felton Road Bannockburn Pinot Noir, a blend from three vineyards, was not as differentiated, with a slightly flat patch on the mid palate.

So there you are: three different vintages from three different regions, but a trifecta for Pinot Noir.

Pinot Noir NZ, part 3a, The Pioneers

This day featured the three regions of Nelson, Waipara (North Canterbury), and Martinborough.

Plantings at Nelson started early i.e. in the late seventies, but did not develop into large holdings. I only tasted two Neudorf Pinot Noirs from there. The Moutere Pinot Noir was quite fresh and acidic, lacking some mouthfeel (88 points). The Home Vineyard Pinot Noir showed much darker colour and a savoury complexity on the palate. I enjoyed this wine (92 points).

The region battling it out with Central Otago for best area to grow Pinot Noir is Martinborough. It is a small area, one hour north of Wellington. You can visit most wineries on foot. Martinborough has quite a marginal climate, resulting in a lot of vintage variation. The Pinot Noirs tend to be lighter in colour, often with a strawberry flavour and a long finish.

The star in general, and of this show as well, is Ata Rangi. The 2010 Pinot Noir is amazing: a lot of depth and elegance, an ethereal mouthfeel, great length and enough acidity to guarantee a long life (96 points). The second wine, the Crimson Pinot Noir is nothing to sneeze at, either. It is a much simpler wine, but has beautiful fruit from newer plantings, and an excellent structure (92 points).

The big eye-turner was Kusuda. If you have ever visited the fruit section of a shop in Tokyo, you would have seen how carefully each individual fruit is treated and displayed, and purchased. This is how Hiroyuki Kusuda treats each individual grape. He released his first wine in 2002 and has kept his production minuscule. It seems he may now enter the big time. The wine tastes of dark cherry, is extremely elegant and very long. Too pretty (95 points)? I also tried the 2008, which has a similar profile, but not as much depth (93 points).

Martinborough Vineyard is one of the pioneers of the area and has kept its quality high since the beginning. In the past, I have tried beautifully aged wines from this producer. The 2010 shows great fruit intensity, is elegant and finished with very polished tannins (94 points).

The best known cult winery from this area, maybe because it is the most expensive wine, is Dry River. The wines tend to be much more savoury and European than the other wines. The 2010 shows great colour, with black and red fruit flavours - an elegant and velvety wine. The structure has not quite come together yet, but probably will (94 points). I also tried the 2000 and 2003, which showed more of the earthy characteristics referred to above (92 points).

Not in the same league as the wines above were Craggy Range Te Muna Road, Brodie, Escarpment (a major disappointment), Gladstone, Johner and Schubert. Some of these wines were a bit fruity, some a little thin in the mouth.  

Review of Waipara will follow in the next post

Pinot Noir NZ 2013 (part 1)

I have been quiet over the last little while, as I attended the big NZ Pinot Noir show in Wellington. This event is held every three years, attracts 500+ participants from New Zealand and around the world, and lasts for four days. I thought the event was very well organised and overall very interesting and informative. Literally all significant Pinot Noir producers are present, and I got a very good idea of where the industry is at. I thought it was worth while going, because New Zealand Pinot Noir is an exciting part of the global wine world, and developing fast.

This year's theme was regionality. The first three days was spent exploring one region each day. For me, this meant:
 - day 1: Central Otago
 - day 2: Martinborough, Nelson, Waipara/ North Canterbury
 - day 3: Marlborough

In a nutshell, there are significant differences between these regions. Firstly, acid levels. These are highest in Marlborough and Nelson, followed by Martinborough. They are quite low in Central Otago. The fruit in the higher acid regions is fresh and vibrant, tasting of red cherries usually, but can be a bit thin. Central Otago Pinot Noir tastes of black cherries and can be quite big and ripe - a Shiraz drinker's Pinot.

All wineries showed the 2010 vintage and then some older vintages. The wines from 2010 were across the board of a very high standard. Surprisingly (to me), the older vintages showed very well, too. Many were from around 2006/07, where this could be expected. But I also tasted a number of wines from 2001 and 2002 which were also still going strong.

I will report on the different regions and its individual wines in subsequent posts. Many favorites showed strongly, but there are also new stars on the horizon.