Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
Red licorice and clove add aromatic details to the polished cherry and raspberry flavors, with cigar box, rosemary and fresh loamy earth notes. Plenty of precision and elegance here, with a long, lingering finish. Drink now through 2028.
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James Suckling
This has impressive depth of fruit as well as fragrant top line perfume. The oak spice suits the dark cherry and sweet earthiness. On the palate there is a punchy frame of tannins that draws tight and fresh through the finish thanks to bracing acidity.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Cornish Point was planted in 2000, so these vines are just entering their prime years. The 2016 Cornish Point Pinot Noir features dark berry notes and hints of thyme, coupled with ample weight on the palate and a soft dusting of tannins on the finish. It's approachable now, but it should age gracefully through 2025.
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.