Vinoculation

Valentines Day 2010, and what better way to enjoy it than a picnic assortment alongside the Kawarau River with a bottle of 2007 Felton Road Block 3 Pinot.

This wine reminded me of my first introduction to Pinot – and indeed Felton Road Pinot – some seven or eight years ago. I had long abstained from Pinot Noir, the red variety that I just wasn’t bourgeois enough to understand, but I gradually began to appreciate what this wine was all about. Delicate. Elegant. Complex. Perfumed. These were descriptors that I came to associate with Pinot Noir and that I continue to look for in this intriguing variety.

Is this the best, if not one of the best Pinot Noirs from New Zealand? Yes.

On opening – and I mean within two seconds of the screwcap having been cracked – I drowned my nose in heady perfume and in that opening minute, it’s quite delightful to follow the journey of the wine’s evolution as it sees oxygen and aeration for the first time since it was bottled; an exercise I’d recommend to all. Initially restrained and muted, but then blooming like an opening flower as waves of aromas begin to take shape.

Everything you’d expect from great Pinot is there – the concentrated berry/cherry fruit, a hint of sappiness, forest floor, herbs, spice and floral perfume – characters you might associate with any old Pinot, but somehow they recombine with x-factor and a fingerprint of place that tells you yes, this is amazing; awakening your senses and leaving you in a reverie where you really have to think to draw your nose away from the glass.

It’s a joyous wine to drink. The hallmarks of Central Otago are here, but the hallmarks that put the region on the map a decade ago, rather than the criticisms by pundits who have almost tended to mock the wines over the past couple years. Clean, juicy fruit, textural generosity (and I’m not talking ballsy Australian Shiraz textural generosity – just enough that maintains typicity without erring on thin territory), assertive aromatics and a long finish abundant with ripe, silky tannins.

As I’ve said before, winemaker Blair Walter’s hand in the winery becomes conspicuous through his absence of intervention, the wine a seamless marriage of fruit and oak that speaks volumes of viticulturist Gareth King’s tireless efforts in the vineyard. Kiwis are fast jumping on the tall poppy syndrome, following suit of their Australian neighbours under the illusion that it’s somehow trendy to criticise and cut down their most exalted wineries, but I’m here to say that these wines have never let me down, they continue to surprise, and I’m very, very happy to have a modest collection to enjoy in future years.