Winemaker Notes
#14 Wine Spectator Top 100 of 2020
On the palate, there is a combination of transparency, power and tension. The silky entry of spice and savory notes expand to pure, deep fruits, braced with acidity, but luscious throughout. The frame is a finely woven lattice work: intricate and detailed with astrong sense of longevity. This exemplary wine is a blend of four properties that elegantly expresses the graceful and more subtle side of Pinot Noir from Bannockburn.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
Aromatic and expressive, with raspberry, cherry and fresh herb notes that are precise on a smooth and supple frame, offering details of matcha green tea, white pepper and forest floor. A hint of fresh nutmeg lingers on the long, expressive finish, where the tannins provide a slight grip. Drink now through 2034.
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James Suckling
Such attractive, mouthwatering aromas of spicy and brambly red cherries. This is in very seductive form in 2018 with supple, smooth and gently creamy, red-cherry and raspberry flavors, delivered in a silky, elegant and smooth mode. Fresh, lithe finish. Drink now. Screw cap.
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Wine Enthusiast
This vintage of Felton Road’s blend of fruit from all four of its vineyards still bears the estate’s signature while being a little less cohesive than its single-site wines, like Block 3. It’s softly spicy with high-toned red berry and plum fruit, green peppercorn and slight mushroomy notes. The palate is neatly structured, hugged by savory, if somewhat blocky tannins. A characterful and approachable drop now.
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.