Winemaker Notes
A very rich, complex and seductive bouquet with aromas of toasty autolysis enveloping scents of baked stone fruit, bakery goods, butter brioche, lemon zest and rose.
Full and rich with savory layers of citrus and stone fruits. The acidity, very fine mousse and natural phenolics show off a wine with texture and finesse.
Varietal: Méthode Traditionelle Blanc de Blancs 100% Chardonnay
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
This is a sparkling wine, showing plenty of brioche and bread dough as well as dried ripe fruit. It’s full-bodied with pie crust and apple tart. This is a rich wine with lots of character at the end. Can work with dinner or as an aperitif. Chardonnay.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The NV No 1 Cuvee is 100% Chardonnay aged two years on the lees prior to disgorgement. It's light to medium-bodied, dry and crisp, with lemon notes and briny-autolytic hints of saltines. Lean and bracing on the palate, refreshingly zesty on the finish, it's fine now as an apéritif or with oysters on the half shell, but it should gain in richness over the next several years.
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Vinous
The non-vintage Methode Traditionelle Cuvee No. 1 is an elegant, light-bodied Chardonnay-based sparkling wine that has fine concentration packed in its core. Having spent two years on lees, it offers a subtle vanilla biscuit character that joins the pure apple and lemon citrus flavors.
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Wine Spectator
Fresh and precise, with ginger, Fuji apple and lemon zest notes that are intense and expressive on a juicy frame. Reveals a hint of candied orange peel on the finish. Drink now. 3,025 cases made, 200 cases imported.
A term typically reserved for Champagne and Sparkling Wines, non-vintage or simply “NV” on a label indicates a blend of finished wines from different vintages (years of harvest). To make non-vintage Champagne, typically the current year’s harvest (in other words, the current vintage) forms the base of the blend. Finished wines from previous years, called “vins de reserve” are blended in at approximately 10-50% of the total volume in order to achieve the flavor, complexity, body and acidity for the desired house style. A tiny proportion of Champagnes are made from a single vintage.
There are also some very large production still wines that may not claim one particular vintage. This would be at the discretion of the winemaker’s goals for character of the final wine.
An icon and leading region of New Zealand's distinctive style of Sauvignon blanc, Marlborough has a unique terroir, making it ideal for high quality grape production (of many varieties). Despite some common generalizations, which could be fairly justified given that Marlborough is responsible for 90% of New Zealand's Sauvignon blanc production, the wines from this region are actually anything but homogenous. At the northern tip of New Zealand’s South Island, the vineyards of Marlborough benefit from well-draining, stony soils, a dry, sunny climate and wide temperature fluctuations between day and night, a phenomenon that supports a perfect balance between berry ripeness and acidity.
The region’s king variety, Sauvignon blanc, is beloved for its pungent, aromatic character with notes of exotic tropical fruit, freshly cut grass and green bell pepper along with a refreshing streak of stony minerality. These wines are made in a wide range of styles, and winemakers take advantage of various clones, vineyard sites, fermentation styles, lees-stirring and aging regimens to differentiate their bottlings, one from one another.
Also produced successfully here are fruit-forward Pinot noirs (especially where soils are clay-rich), elegant Riesling, Pinot gris and Gewürztraminer.