Wine Article

“The grapes for this wine are primarily the low-yielding Mendoza clone, known for its concentration of flavor and crisp acidity, the balance were from Clone 95. The vineyards are in the lower reaches of the Brancott Valley and Fairhall, grown in gravelly, clay-loam soils, the remainder coming from Rapaura, grown in young alluvial soils containing high proportions of New Zealand’s ubiquitous greywacke river stones.

“The vineyards were hand-picked separately at high ripeness levels and whole bunch pressed using very low maceration press cycles. The resulting juice was lightly settled and racked to FR oak barriques (20% new). The juice was allowed to undergo spontaneous indigenous yeast fermentation, the final phase continuing for many months. The wine received occasional lees stirring and underwent a complete malo-lactic fermentation. It was transferred out of oak after 18 months and bottled in November 2015. 14.5% ABV, 6.0 g/l T.A., & 3.28 pH;” 150 cases imported to the U.S.

96 pts & #38/100 Best Wines < $30 for '18, JamesSuckling.com (Stock, 1/21/19),
94 Vinous (Martin, 11/1/18),
92 ea Int’l Wine Review (Winkler, 1/22/18) & WS (Worobiec, 8/31/17),
91 ea WA (Perrotti-Brown, 12/’16) & The Wine Front (Walsh, 9/28/18),
90 WE (Pickard, 5/1/18) @ $29, and
89 ea Decanter Panel (11/1/17) & Falstaff Magazine (7/18)!