Australia vs. New Zealand Pinot Noir Tasting

 A couple of days ago, I tasted six premium Australian and six premium New Zealand Pinot Noirs. Who came out ahead? Perhaps surprising, I scored the Australian Pinot Noirs slightly higher. Why? There were clearly country differences. The Australian wines were quite savoury and often with good energy. The New Zealand wines were fruitier and often a little round with not enough to show on the finish.

My top wine, unexpected, was the 2019 Picardy Tête de Cuvée from Pemberton. This is Picardy's best Pinot Noir of the vintage. Some of the fruit is densely planted, and the yields are low. The wine opens quite light on the palate, as the red and dark cherry fruit emerges. This is quite a complex and earthy wine with cigar box flavours underneath. The tannins are fine, supported by 30% whole bunch, and the finish is long (96/+++ points). Just behind was the 2020 Ata Rangi Pinot Noir, quite an intense, dark fruited wine. The mouthfeel is plush and smooth, and very textural. The wine has good persistence and a long finish (96/+++ points). 

In the next level came the highly acclaimed 2022 Ossa Pinot Noir from the Belrose vineyard near Swansea. The fruit is quite young and vibrant, and the wine has good intensity, but feels slightly blocky in the mouth. The 2022 Giant Steps Wombat Creek tasted of red cherry, with medium intensity and fine tannins - overall a more balanced wine. Also impressive was the 2018 Moondarra Sambaside Pinot Noir, a new label to me. This wine was on the lighter side with savoury notes, not dissimilar to the Picardy (93/94 points for these wines).

The next group included three wines from New Zealand, the 2022 Two Paddocks Estate Pinot Noir, the 2021 Valli Gibbston Vineyard Pinot Noir, and the 2022 High Garden Vineyard Pinot Noir. As mentioned, these wines have a strong fruit profile, but were not as well structured as the wines above (92 points).

The final group included the 2021 Stonier Reserve Pinot Noir, the 2021 Shaw & Smith Lenswood Pinot Noir, the 2020 Neudorf Home Block, and the 2016 Fromm Cuvee H Pinot Noir - all 90 points.

Australian versus New Zealand Pinot Noir (a mini comparison)

It is very interesting to compare Australian and New Zealand Pinot Noir. In my opinion, there are interesting parallels, for example between Central Otago and Mornington Peninsula on the one hand, and Martinborough and the Yarra Valley on the other.

This was a brief tasting of six high quality wines.

The 2010 Picardy Pinot Noir from Pemberton, W.A. is expected to be a little different. I thought this was an excellent wine. The colour has a tinge of orange, and the flavours are savoury. What makes this wine exceptional is the elegance on the palate. Picardy's best? (94 points)

The 2012 Bindi Original Vineyard Pinot Noir shows more fruit by comparison. It is quite acidic and tannic and linear on the palate. This wine will live for many years (93 points).

The 2012 Yabby Lake Block 2 Pinot Noir is the little brother of the Jimmy Watson winner. I have not tasted these wines before. I found this wine to be quite earthy and lacking some elegance when compared with the first two. It is a well structured wine (92 points).

The 2011 Akarua Pinot Noir from Central Otago was the weakest in this line-up. The wine is a little fruity and lacked structure and length (90 points).

The 2011 Mount Edwards Pinot Noir from Central Otago was a more appealing wine. It has softer strawberry flavours and fine tannins. It reminded me of Mt. Difficulty. (93 points)

The star of this line-up, the 2011 Ata Rangi Pinot Noir, did not disappoint, although it is not their strongest wine ever. It is of medium weight, with good length and soft tannins. The oak integration is excelllent. This wine will live for many years (94 points).

So how about Australia versus New Zealand? The tasting showed, not surprisingly, the very high standard Pinot Noir has achieved in both countries. I call it a draw.

Picardy Pinot Noir

Picardy is not a well known winery in the Eastern parts of Australia. I suggest you ckeck it out. The other day I had the 2009 Picardy Pinot Noir. The berry flavours are hard to define, somewhere between strawberry and cherry. More importantly, this is quite a savoury wine with forest floor characteristics and an excellent texture. It finishes with silky tannins.

To achieve a higher score, the wine would have needed a bit more grip or an expanding finish, but I liked it anyhow.

Score: 92/++

Bill Pannell Book Launch

The Pannell family has been associated with three major Australian wineries: Moss Wood, Picardy and SC Pannell. On the occasion of Bill Pannell launching his autobiography "Once more unto the vine", we were given a treat to taste wines from all three wineries.

The Picardy wines from Pemberton, in the south of Western Australia, are best known for their Burgundian wines, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. The 2009 Picardy Pinot Noir was impressive for its cherry fruit and forest floor savory flavours (93 points). The 2008 'Tete de Cuvée' Pinot Noir contains 50 per cent French fruit. It is much more backward, quite savory, and a wine to keep (92 points).

Of the Moss Wood wines, I tasted the 2009 Moss Wood Chardonnay and the 2008 Moss Wood Cabernet Sauvignon. The Chardonnay is A big wine. The focus is on texture, rather than fruit. The new oak is currently quite prominent and makes the wine creamy. The wine has good length and will be better in 2-3 years (92 points). The 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon is quite an amazing wine. It has a lot of quite deep, even dense black currant fruit, yet it is elegant, with good acidity and soft, silky tannins. Based on other Moss Wood experiences, this wine will last for 20+ years, and improve for at least 10 years. The fruit will show more complexity and integrate into the texture of the wine. Every Cabernet lover should buy this wine (I did) (97 points).

SC Pannell is the label of Stephen Pannell. The wines are from Mclaren Vale, but they are not typical for the region. The fruit is very vibrant and probably picked much earlier than what is the norm. The focus is on freshness and forward fruit flavours. The 2009 Tempranillo Touriga is quite light, but with backbone (91 points). The 2010 Grenache is very young and fruity (88 points). The 2007 Shiraz/Grenache has a similar flavours profile, but more weight, due to the Shiraz component (90 points). The 2008 Nebbiolo would be my pick, although it is not similar to the Piedmont wines. It has the floral notes, but has quite a Burgundian character. The wine is not very concentrated, but has good precision and length (92 points). Overall, these wines impress by the purity of their fruit. However, in terms of their mouthfeel, I would prefer the Spinifex wines from Barossa.

In summary, this was a fascinating tasting, to see the variety which these wineries bring to the table. All wines are well made and they show real character.

Picardy, Kooyong, Elderton

A couple of days later I went to another wine-ark tasting with an interesting line-up of Picardy, from Pemberton, W.A., Kooyong, Mornington Peninsula, and Elderton from the Barossa.

The Picardy wines are cooler climate and quite light. They have the reputation of being well crafted, but to me there is simply not enough fruit expression and depth to the wine. The 2006 Pinot Noir would have been my pick, because it had a good combination of light berry and forest floor flavour, but it lacked some length, in my view. The other wines were an 07 Chardonnay, 05 Shiraz and 05 Merlot/Cabernet/Cabernet Franc.

Kooyong specializes in Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. It uses only estate grown grapes and has a three tiered structure with the Chardonnay Clonale and the Pinot Noir Massale at the bottom, then the Estate wines, and then a few single vineyard wines using the best grapes from designated blocks.

The entry level wines tend to be great value for money, as they essentially are made in the same way as the other wines, but with lesser, but still pretty good grapes. The 07 Clonale Chardonnay proved this point It had lovely citrus and peach fruit flavours. The Estate wines are neither fish nor fowl. They are more expensive, and more subtle wines, but do not reach the expression of the single vineyard wines. And so it was on this night with both the Chardonnay and Pinot Noir.

On tasting was also the 06 Farrago Chardonnay and the 06 Haven Pinot Noir. The Farrago had predominantly citrus flavours, relatively light, but well structured and good length. The Haven displayed plush, dark fruit characteristics, good complexity with quite serious tannins and a long finish. This was a very attractive wine and my wine of the night. It proved that Kooyong is one of the elite producers from Mornington Peninsula, next to Main Ridge, Paringa, Stoniers and a couple of others.

Elderton showed its 06 range of red wines, the Merlot, the Shiraz and the Cabernet Sauvignon. These are wines with generous fruit, fairly forward, but well priced at $25/bottle. Then came the 06 Ashmead Cabernet Sauvignon, their flagship Cabernet. This wine sees French oak in addition to American. It has darker fruit, with good intensity, but is not overdone. It has good length and medium tannin strength. My criticism for a wine in this price bracket would be that it does not have as much finesse as the best in this league.