By Anto Coates
Kumeu River, like Martinborough Vineyard in Martinborough, has
the good fortune to be the first winery you think about when you think of the
general winegrowing region Kumeu. Kumeu
River has always backed up their great
wines with sound marketing, which has led to a formiddable international reputation – and the name certainly beats the hell out of ‘San Marino’, which
sounds more like a ram stud farm than what the winery was known as until 1986.
I’ve now had the opportunity
to taste Kumeu River Wines in a variety of different settings – ranging from the
Kumeu cellar door to the end-of-vintage ‘knees up’ hosted in the winery. The
latest and most complete tasting was a tutored one at Regional Wines on Monday
19 July. Each time, the wines have acquitted themselves very well (certainly
better than I did at the aforementioned knees up).
Paul Brajkovich was our host
for the evening. He is a tall, distinguished-looking man who looks rather
serious on first inspection, but he has an easy affinity with the wines that
comes from growing up in the family vineyard (it’s rumoured that his first words
were actually ‘malolactic fermentation’). His brother, winemaker Michael
Brajkovich MW, was away in the family’s native Croatia, which was a shame, as I
was hoping to ask him what he thought of being referred to by a couple of
female winemakers as “the thinking-woman’s crumpet”.
Paul took us through a
flight of wines that began with the Kumeu River Village Chardonnay 2008 (17.5+/20)
on its own. It certainly set the tone for the acidity we could expect from the
evening. The Village always represents great value for money and those who choke
on oak or like a crisp Chablisian style of Chardy will struggle to find much
better than this locally. With 1/3 barrel ferment in old barrels and the rest
stainless, it’s got a great chemistry with seafood and crisp salads.
The next three wines were
the Estate Chardonnays 08, 07 and 06. The Estate 08 (18.5+/20) had a peachy-fresh
nose with just a hint of lees on the palate. The balance was probably the best
of the flight and like most of the wines its 100% malo was hidden better than a
hipflask at the Betty Ford Centre. Paul Brajkovich actually apologised for the
oak which tells you all you need to know about the restraint of the entire range
of wines.
The Estate Chardonnay 07 (18.0/20)
again struck me as quite Chablisian and had the lovely freshly squeezed lemon
that makes these wines cry out for food. The Estate 06 (18.0+/20) is starting
to develop some nice golden straw to go with a complex nose of talc and nougat
over a lemon tart palate.
The next flight showed the
Coddington 08 and the Hunting Hill 08 side by side. They are both Clone 15
Chardonnays, but grown 3km apart and quite different remixes of the same song.
The Coddington 08 (19.0+/20) looked a bit of a step up, with a deep golden
colour and then peach and nectarine integrating well to a light biscuity and
nutty finish. The Hunting Hill 08 (19.0-/20) is immediately richer and rounder,
with great structure and balanced acidity and an attractive hint of salt on the
finish, which is supposed to come from the nearby Muriwai Beach,
but equally could come from the iron pan underneath the Hunting Hill vineyard.
The Hunting Hill had a little bit of a rubbery/match strike to it, which some
of our number objected to, but most thought it was at acceptable levels.
Next it was on to the main
event, the Maté’s vertical from 08-06. Named after the Brajkovich family
patriarch Maté, the wines are arguably the benchmark of Chardonnay in this
country. The Maté’s 08 (19.5/20) was at first a little closed on the nose, but
then either it opened up or I did. It began to display lovely coconut and peach
cobbler, followed by the lip-smacking acidity of a nearly ripe peach. It’s a
complete wine and was probably the wine of the night – quite a steal at the
price too.
The Maté’s 07 (19.5-/20) was
also an outrageously good wine – deep gold, beautifully structured, long and
elegant, with light toasty oak and biscuity lees. It was a very close race
between this and the 08 for line honours but I went with the 08 because it
slipped me a 50.
Sadly, the Maté’s 06
(17.0/20) was quite reductive and was in the wrong company to pull a stunt like
that. It seemed to blow off a little after some good air time though so will
have to reevaluate at a later date.
Of course we all know the
Kumeu River Chardonnays are sharp, but who knew they made Pinot Gris as well as
this. The Pinot Gris 09 (18.5/20) was a very nice example in an off-dry style.
Pretty white florals (that don’t feel like they’ll give you hayfever, mind you
– elegance is everything) leading to I thought a hint of bot on the palate and
the merest hint of phenolics on the back palate, which is actually more of a
compliment than it sounds for most local Pinot Gris I have tried lately.
To finish the tasting we
tried the Pinot Noirs 06 and 07, which is a little like getting up to sing
karaoke after Mariah Carey. Opinion was divided about the wines, because while
they weren’t bad, they did look a little pale next to the quality that had come
before. I thought I spied a touch of volatility on the 07 but the general
consensus was that the 06 was drinking the nicer of the two.
But such was the quality of
the wines on show, the Pinot Noirs were in no way anti-climactic. I think we
all felt privileged to have tried so many lovely Burgundian expressions of
Chardonnay on one evening (and actually feel like we could all afford to buy
some). A big thanks to Paul Brajkovich for coming and talking us through them
all and we’re already looking forward to the next vintage.