Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Decanter
Seductive, floral and gently perfumes with a core of light red fruits and sweet oak. Softly spicy and organic. Complex, plush, soft, generous and enticing. Very fine tannins, exciting wine, long finish. Drink 2018-2020.
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James Suckling
A bold, flavorsome, polished and utterly delicious Central Otago pinot from the Sauvage Family Vineyard at the southern end of the Pisa Range in the Cromwell Basin. Aromas run a range from orange rind to blueberries, raspberries, red cherries and sweetly toasted oak spices. Very fresh though. The palate's pitch-perfect — seemingly almost weightless — and yet there's a bright and pure core of blueberry and red-cherry flavors. Fine tannins are on offer and the acid sits just right, while the flavors hold fresh, all the way up to the cherry pip finish
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Medium ruby-purple colored, the 2014 Burn Cottage Vineyard Pinot Noir has a profoundly perfumed nose with well-defined notes of violets, lavender, red roses and fragrant earth over a core of black cherries and mulberries plus a waft of cloves. Medium-bodied with a seamless backbone of finely grained tannins and lively acid, it gives an abundance of pure black and red berry flavors, finishing with superb length.
Rating: 93+ -
Wine Spectator
Complex, ripe plum and black cherry flavors are accented by lavender, white pepper and nutmeg notes. The firm, taut tannins form an appealing backbone, with wild brush and dried herb accents gaining momentum on the finish. Complex, ripe plum and black cherry flavors are accented by lavender, white pepper and nutmeg notes. The firm, taut tannins form an appealing backbone, with wild brush and dried herb accents gaining momentum on the finish.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
Home to the globe’s most southerly vineyards, which are cultivated below the 45th parallel, Central Otago is a true one-of-a-kind wine growing region, but not only because of its extreme location.
Central Otago is more dependent on one single variety than any other region in New Zealand—and it isn’t Sauvignon blanc. They don’t even make Sauvignon blanc there.
Pinot Noir claims nearly 75% of the region’s vineyards with Pinot Gris coming in a far second place and Riesling behind it. This is also New Zealand’s only wine region with a continental climate, giving it more diurnal and seasonal temperature shifts than any other.
The subregion of Bannockburn has enjoyed the most success historically but the area’s exceptional growth has moved to the promising regions of Cromwell/Bendigo and Alexandra districts. Central Otago is known for its fruity and full-bodied Pinot noir. With the freedom to experiment here, growers and winemakers are easily exhibiting the area’s great potential.