New Zealand has knack of doing SOME great Sauvignon Blanc and great Pinot Noir, but whats this “Falcon” Pinot Noir from Lake Chalice like?
Its light, dry and pretty smooth. You get aromas of cranberry and strawberry with redcurrant and vanilla. These feed into the taste with a little plum and cherry adding to it. All light and subtle with a beautiful smoothness that makes you want to savour this wine rather than gulp it. Its not that expensive at £15 a bottle, at the lower end of New Zealand pinot Noir and very good value.
Lake Chalice, Falcon, Pinot Noir, 2016, New Zealand
This Paddy Borthwick Pinot Noir is from Wairarapa on the south part of the north island of New Zealand. Light, smooth, dry and fabulous is how I can best describe this wine.
There are aromas of leather, cherry, redcurrant and strawberry with a oaky earthy notes in there. There are additional flavours of mushroom, plum, tobacco which are all in balance with each other, nothing too much poking through. This is a very enjoyable and very drinkable wine, recommend all year round with or without food. Cracking.
At £18 a bottle its good value for an excellent New Zealand Pinot Noir.
Light, dry, smooth, good fruit levels with a decent hit of acidity is what describes this wine. There are tannins, these are well integrated and there’s red fruit aromas of sour cherry and redcurrant on the nose and in the mouth. You get extra flavours of plum, spice, herbs and oak which add up to a great experience.
Germany wine is so under rated outside of Germany. Yes in the past and still now, we in the UK don’t always get the best in the supermarkets, but go to a wine merchant and you can get some crackers with very few duff ones. This got a silver at the Decanter World Wine Awards and it well deserves it.
H J Kreuzberg, Sonnenberg 2016, Spatburgunder, Ahr, Germany
New Zealand wine was made on the back of some excellent Sauvignon Blanc, Cloudy Bay and Greywacke to name 2.
Pinot Noir is another excellent wine that New Zealand produces and so far I’ve not had a bad bottle, you do get some poor NZ Sav Blanc now a days. Russian Jack is Majestic wine in house NZ Pinot Noir and at £13 a bottle it’s not a cheap NZ Pinot Noir.
You get a fair amount of red fruit, strawberry, redcurrant, plum, cherry, both on the nose and in the mouth. It’s dry with an earthy undertone but it’s a little light all round. There’s little tannins and it’s quite smooth. At £10 or under this would be great but for 3 or 4 pounds more you can get better. Personal I would say nice, but spend a bit more.
New Zealand does Pinot Noir as good as the best in the world. There is wonderful red fruit on the nose. It’s silky smooth, elegant and quite light, yet there are deep complex flavours with hints of dark berries with a touch of pepper and spices. Great levels of acidity, tannins excellent length and a perfect finish.
As you get the idea I loved this wine, I’m surprised it only got a silver medal at the IWSC, for me this is so Gold or above. The only downside is the price at over £30 a bottle which would put people off. Just do it, order it today.
Matua Single Vineyard Pinot Noir 2014, Central Otago, New Zealand
From Marlborough in New Zealand this is an easy drinking dry, fruit driven Pinot Noir rose wine. You get the usual aromas of strawberry and redcurrant and those follows on in the taste. You also get hints of peach and a clean mineral taste.
There’s more flavour that a French Provence rose wine but at £14 a bottle it’s a little bit pricey, very nice but too much for rose. Straight Pinot Noir from New Zealand is only a few pounds more and you get a wine that generally out classes much of the European Pinot Noir reds.
Spy Valley – Pinot Noir Rosé 2017 from New Zealand
This is a seriously grown up Cava. Made with Pinot Noir grapes and aged on its lees for over 2 years you get elegant small bubbles with aromas of citrus and honeysuckle and hints of yeasty notes. The flavours are subtle and fruit driven with citrus and a creaminess that makes this a refreshing alternative to other Cava’s out there.
The only issue I have is the price, at £25 a bottle its worth it but I can see people just look at the “Cava” part and pass it by, shame for them but good news for those that are willing to try it.
We spent the on an old sailing barge that sailed out of Ipswich. On the way back to the train station we stopped off at the Majestic Ipswich store. They have a new system there where the wines are ordered in style rather than just country, which makes choosing a wine much much easier. Well done to Majestic for doing something that really helps the average customer.
Chris the manager showed us a wine he had opened for a previous customer called the Main Divide, a Pinot Noir from New Zealand. It had aromas of oak and smoke with black fruit. The the flavours were quite rich, black fruit, spice and a smokey undertone which was refreshing for a Pinot Noir. This was not a weak red but had character. At £20 a bottle it’s not cheap but it is a cracking wine.
Each year we invite a few winemakers and people in the wine industry for a bit of food, drink.and possibly intelligent conversation, or at least conversation! In past years this has included people from the Decanter magazine, winemakers and wine sellers. Usually we have some English wine, unusual wine, weird wine and crackingly good wine. This evening was no different. Above are the wines drunk. For food we had tapas style food, breads, pates, fish, meat and cheese selections.
Going from left to right we started with Mexican sparkling wine made with Macabeu (a spanish grape), Chardonnay and Chenin Blanc. A little sweet for my taste but more of the Macabeu grape character coming through. It got a bronze medal at the Decanter World Wine Awards. Next was Bethnal Bubbles from a winery in Bethnal Green, east end of London. Some said weird, I said “oooohhhhh, it’s weird” unfiltered sparkling with a hoppy taste and green apple notes. At £23 a bottle it’s a good party conversation piece but not one I’ll get.
Then we went through some English white wines, light and fruity with lots of citrus. The Toppesfield vineyard 2018 Bacchus was excellent, I tried it just after bottling and thought they over extracted, a few months on and the wine is tasting much better with much more fruit. The Ashdown Estate from Bluebell vineyard white was lighter but very drinkable.
The Alsace Schlumberger Grand Cru 2014 Riesling. Full rich flavours of citrus, peach, lychee and a smell of petroleum, magnificent. Burnt Foot Pinot Noir rose followed. Good red fruit flavours and one of the better Pinot Noir wines from the UK.
Next was King Coel red, 20 year old English red that tasted fresh and had vibrant red fruit flavours. For me the highlight as it was under the winemakers stairs for much of that time, please see the blog for a write up. The Potash vineyard red was only 7 years old! but had lost some of its fruit flavours, drinkable but one wine to slip and not knock back, so to enjoy the flavours. A South Africa red followed, Lemberg-Louis 2016 made with Shiraz, Mourvedre and Granache, richer red fruit flavours with black cherry and higher tannins, excellent with the meat course.
The last wines were 2 late bottle vintage ports, grahams 2005 and Quinta Sta Eufemia 2019, both excellent ruby ports with rich fruit and smooth finish were drunk with the cheese course and on their own and finally we had a Czech desert wine, Pechor Vinarstvi 2015 Ryzlink Rynsky, light and full of citrus flavour.
The next afternoon the ones that stayed and had a midd BBQ felt the long night!
