WELLINGTON WINE REVIEW | One NETWORK – WL

In the wineries of New Zealand, our winemakers are relieved that harvest 2024 is done and dusted. With most of the grapes picked in March and April, all now know what they have in the winery, and depending on the variety we might even see some tiny early bottlings with the year 2024 on the label.

If such an early bottling happens it will most likely be NZ’s famous varietal Sauvignon Blanc going first. In recent years there has been a race to bottle, ship, and get the new vintage of ‘sav blanc’ on the shelves asap. People familiar with the official race to bottle the French have with their ‘Beaujolais Nouveau’ will possibly know that they bottle within 6-8 weeks after harvest crazy fast and leads to a wine that needs to be drunk within some 6 months of bottling.

Sometimes it felt that we in NZ were trying to do the same speed at the price of quality Most winemakers will tell you that a calm approach, taking time to let the wines ‘settle out’ naturally will lead to a product with more complexity and a bit more longevity as well.

We’re living in strange tight economic times making a lot of households slow down on alcohol purchases, in their homes and certainly in the restaurants that is if they get into restaurants at all still. This is a global trend and I won’t even mention the younger drinkers often replacing wine with premixed drinks or other alternatives.

New Zealand is extremely lucky with its zingy fresh crisp Sauvignon Blanc dominating by over 80% what we as a country send abroad: It is a wine that appeals to all age groups and all genders all over the world.

During the last 10-15 years our winemakers have used the Sauvignon Blanc grapes to make different styles of this wine: 100% made in steel, giving you that zippy zing we all know so well, still in the majority. However when they put in a tiny percentage of barrel-fermented Sauvignon Blanc, say just 5 %, you’ll get a different wine. Obviously then some winemakers go all the way: 100% handpicked fruit fermented 100% in barrels, these are the more ‘out there’ examples of what can be done to produce wines from the same grape for different moments of the day and different food combinations as well.

So what is this ‘beauty of the unknown’?

Since you might have to wait a bit for the new ‘early’ zippy zingy 2024 we urge you to try slightly older Sauvignon Blancs, a 2023, or go older, much older than that.

Go for slightly different ones too, brands of small boutique wineries you never tried before or Sauvignon Blancs that have had some ‘barrel work’ explore and find beauty in these innovative styles and scarcer brands.

You will be delighted!

Let us have your comments once you’ve tried the less traditional Sav. Blanc styles our correspondent suggests.

Questions? we’ll arrange for Geoff to answer them.