BORDEAUX BLENDS
My experience of Kiwi Bordeaux-style blends from the 2010s and earlier was that they were typically much lighter in colour, alcohol and body, making them a gift in a blind tasting. Climate change has meant that ripening even cabernet sauvignon has gotten easer of late, but the alcohol levels remain appealingly low (a graceful 12.5 per cent like old Bordeaux). Though not easy to find, the wines listed here are more likely than others to be sold with some age on them, thanks to the evident ambition of the people who made them. Here I’ve listed them from oldest to youngest.
Providence 1994
Tasted at a 2018 Hong Kong Wine Society dinner held by The Fine Wine Experience’s Linden Wilkie, this demonstrates why Providence from Matakana, north of Auckland, is a watchword among Kiwi wine insiders. With its sheer garnet colour and sun-dried tomato, dried cherry and rose hip perfume, it seduces with a sensuous outer layer over nubbly tannins in a way that is pinot-like and enveloping.
Esk Valley Terraces 2000
Another wine out of Wilkie’s stash, this is the jewel in the crown of Hawke’s Valley old-timer Esk Valley (called Glenvale Winery & Cellars when it was founded in 1933). A blend built on malbec, merlot and cabernet franc gleaned from steeply terraced vineyards has yielded a 20-year-old wine of open plushness, with a rose-perfumed, satiny outer layer swaddling a firm, salty centre.
Te Motu 2010
One of the oldest vineyards planted on Waiheke Island, this understated, intimate property is quietly turning out wines of great depth and grace. The fruit is dark and brooding, amplified by bell-peppery hints and pencil shavings that are starting to shade into cedar. The palate reveals a toothsome meatiness and a tight grain that promises years of slow evolution.
Te Mata Coleraine 2014
Coleraine is finally gaining icon status. It is a slightly sturdier, more forthright beast than the other wines listed here (more Pauillac than Margaux), with an opening volley of eucalyptus, menthol and cedar giving way to a restrained cassis polish. Compared to the virtually tanninless lilt of a fair number of Kiwi reds, this one leaves you in no doubt of its structure with an attack that is rocky and dark. The finish is all lovely lucent fruit and clean acid.