Every spring, Sir George and Lady Gail Fistonich invite members of the wholesale and retail wine trade and wine writers, to the Villa Maria Trade Day, held most recently in November 2011. Guests are invited to the winery to taste a range of the Villa Maria companies’ award and trophy winning wines. The wines shown are all from vineyards Villa Maria either owns or controls, and display impeccable style in the grape varieties they represent. Everything about the day is deftly executed. The winery buildings are modern, and beautifully proportioned, standing in a landscape that feels like the great hall and the buildings and grounds of a grand European rural retreat. The rich green of mown lawns blends into the bright green of vines on gentle slopes, set off on the open day by bright sunshine, and blue sky randomly patterned by soft white clouds.
The wines presented to the visitors at the trade day were all among the best of their variety, and Air New Zealand Wine Awards medal winners if they were old enough to have been entered. A great many of the Trade Day wines were gold medal winners at the Air New Zealand Wine Awards or the Liquorland Royal Easter Show. Admission to the trade day is by invitation only. Wine tastings were conducted throughout the day by Villa Maria winemakers on topics that included; An introduction to wine tasting; Sustainability and Organics, which related to vineyard practice and management of the environment of the company’s vineyards in Hawkes Bay, Gisborne and Marlborough; “Our Take on the Rhone”; “North Island Chardonnay at its Best”; and “Marlborough’s success with the Pinot Family”, illustrated by a selection of new releases. Villa Maria is producing increasingly complex Pinot Noir from Marlborough. “The Rhone” refers to the deep coloured reds of the Rhone Valley in France and the Villa Maria take on Rhone wines was illustrated by Syrah, grown and produced from Villa Maria’s vineyards in Hawkes Bay. The Rhone Valley is a comparatively hot area in southern central France, with summer temperatures above the New Zealand norm. The selection of a warm climate white wine was a wine made from the Italian variety Arneis grown in Gisborne. Villa Maria Arneis is sturdy, lively and deeply scented, with something like the scent of Riesling but with gaudy opulence, and structural fullness that set it apart from the delicacy of fine Riesling. It works well. Both red and white examples showed fineness of balance, depth and concentration..
The wines tasted at Trade Day 2011 were the current vintages of wines from vineyards that date back to the vine planting boom of the early1980s in Marlborough, Hawkes Bay and Gisborne. Vine age was a theme discussed in the open day seminars. Vine maturity is as vital to wine quality as are soil, climate, and careful husbandry, a concept becoming evident in New Zealand wine as the wine of older vineyards becomes more prominent in the national grape harvest. Europeans have known for years of the link between old vines and wine quality, a connection that parallels everything else we know about life. The wine of older vines is deeper flavoured than the wine of young vines. It holds better in the glass, and is better able to unfold and reveal itself as it breaths. Young vines wine can be charming but a flash in the pan. The roots of older vines spread further and produce more regular crops which stabilise over time in terms of yield and ripen more evenly, to be expressed in their wine in heightened bouquet and in palate weight, colour intensity, brightness, and purity of tone, and in the hard to put your finger on sensation of taste and aroma unfolding in the glass. Chardonnay is a good example of the phenomenon in New Zealand wine. It suits our climate and our soils and was the earliest white wine variety to be taken seriously here, in the era before Sauvignon Blanc blitzed the British market. As a white wine, Chardonnay can be easier to read than red, and it illustrates well the importance of old vines. Chardonnay is very much more important to New Zealand wine than prejudice based on popular chic appears to understand. It has class, and ages well. The same development of depth and sophistication is being seen in red wines as vineyards age. Pinot Noir from Marlborough and Martinborough, and Syrah and Merlot from Hawkes Bay have been in the ground long enough to be producing wines of depth, richness and tannin to give them the capacity to age. Vine age brings middle aged refinement to New Zealand wine.
Written By Tim Harris Blog: Howe St, Wine Report Auckland NZ
Timhhrs6@gmail.com
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