The long awaited vintage 2022 Coleraine harnesses the energy and complexity of Te Mata Cabernet Sauvignon, on show at its highest level since the first Coleraine in 1982.

Beautiful floral aromas of lavender, violet, plum and blackcurrant, are all in orbit around the wine’s dark savoury core of tightly wound graphite, nori, coffee grounds, vanilla and tobacco.  The palate is intensely concentrated, with a superbright tension building freshness and precision as layer upon layer of fine polished tannins give pinpoint detail alongside signature, exacting, levels of finesse.

Coleraine '22 is a modern reprise of what makes Coleraine iconic, a wine balancing past and future, heritage and innovation. This is a statement wine, one that lingers both on the palate and in the mind.

 

In Te Reo Māori, Waikoa translates to happy waters.

The 2023 Waikoa is a return to a blend of varietals. Riesling and Sauvignon Blanc from friends who own the Grava vineyard. This wine brings me joy for its salivating deliciousness and makes me think of spring and summer sunshine filled days.

Partial whole cluster inclusion and wild fermentation, time on skins give it beautiful aromatics & texture. Karla & Alistair who farm Grava are BioGro certified organic! So good!

A perfumed nose of florals, citrus, wild fennel and honeydew in a beech forest during summer. The palate is driven by refreshing citrus fruits, lime & pink grapefruit and a long pithy textured palate.

Serve lightly chilled on a warm day or served with fresh kaimoana.

If you like Chardonnay, you'll love this sparkling Hawke's Bay blancs de blancs made from  Alpha Domus winery. 

All of the grapes in this wine were hand picked, whole bunch pressed and fermented to bone dry (one gram of residual sugar). It was made from 26 year old Clone 6 Chardonnay vines grown at Bridge Pa in Hawke’s Bay and disgorged at Soljans in West Auckland, which has all the gear for making high end sparkling wine. 

This beautiful creamy, full bodied bubbly over delivers big time, showing yet again just how good New Zealand's best sparkling wines can be. 

“Bin 389 was often referred to as ‘Baby Grange’, in part because components of the wine are matured in the same barrels that held the previous vintage of Grange. First made in 1960 by the legendary Max Schubert, this was the wine that helped forge Penfolds reputation with red wine drinkers by combining the structure of Cabernet Sauvignon with the richness of Shiraz. Exemplifying the judicious balance of fruit and oak, Bin 389 highlights the generous mid-palate Penfolds in known for.” – Winemaker’s notes.

One of New Zealand's premium Syrahs. Deep and savoury with rich tannins. The vines are planted in the stoniest parts of the vineyard to a heritage clone of Syrah brought to New Zealand in the 1840s. 

"Inky purple red. Enticing aromatics of boysenberry, blueberry, violets, clove and lightly seared meat. The wine exhibits a richness of fruit yet carries an ethereal quality as the fine grained tannins dance gracefully across the palate." Winemaker's note.

Winery Notes:

An exotic nose of baking spices, pear, peach and cashew. This single block
Chardonnay naturally builds on the palate initially with ripe fruits,
beautifully restrained by fine-grained oak and integrated acidity. A long
flowing wine ready now, or age for up to ten years for increased complexity.

Note from our Viticulturist Mike Saunders :
Erin's Chardonnay grows on our steepest and highest slopes, in limestone soils which
impact a beautiful minerality and tension to the wine. The block is 100% Mendoza clone, its natural acidity is a perfect companion for the limestone soils. The small berries and thick skins from 2018 have created a wine with concentration and fine phenolics which add to the structure of the wine. Variation between the top and bottom of the slope adds layers of different flavours to the fruit and texture of the resulting wine. Extensive leaf plucking and bunch thinning ensured balanced crop loads and even ripening.

Note from our Winemaker Dom Maxwell :
We hand picked our steepest block of Mendoza Chardonnay before a gentle whole-bunch pressing to tank without additions. We allowed the juice to settle overnight before we racked to French oak barrels for wild fermentation and full malo-lactic fermentation. The extended nature of fermentation brings not only richness to the wine but also layers and complexity. Barrel ageing lasts 15 months before the wine was estate bottled without fining

One per customer please - thank you

A silky, elegant, structured and commanding wine, which drinks well now and can age for the medium to long term. The biodynamically farmed Calvert Vineyard is home to both Pinot Noir and a smidgeon of Chardonnay and is situated on Felton Road in Bannockburn, Central Otago. This vineyard lies just below the hills of the Bannockburn gold sluicings and makes beautiful wine, one of Central Otago's most consistently highly rated Pinot Noirs every year with its great fruit purity. approachability and aging potential.

A great investment in your cellar.

Coddington is one of Kumeu River’s finest Chardonnays. The nose is deep and complex, with ripe stone-fruit and citrus notes, complemented by creamy barrel-ferment notes and spicy oak richness. This medium bodied wine is elegant, rich and fruity on the palate with excellent balanced acidity and a lengthy finish. Coddington is drinking excellently now but will reward from further cellaring.

Greystone is one of North Canterbury's wine stars situated on the slopes of limestone rich hills in Omihi. All of the grapes that go into Greystone wines are 100% certified organic with BioGro NZ and all are estate grown. No additional fruit is purchased to supplement production, which is one of many incremental steps that go into Greystone's high quality wines. 

This impressive Pinot Noir is the top of the Pinot tree at Greystone. It's made from fully destemmed whole berries which were cold macerated and fermented with wild yeasts, 25% of the wine having been fermented in small tanks amongst the vines, which ensures a completely wild vineyard yeast fermentation. The wine is bottled without fining, filtration or cold stabilisation.

It drinks well now but will reward those with patience to wait for it to develop further with age and has the potential to evolve positively for up to a decade, if kept in good conditions. 

Certified organic with BioGro NZ.

About Greystone

The Greystone wine story began in 2000 when the Thomas Family bought an old sheep farm on the Omihi hills in the Waipara Valley, North Canterbury. The rolling limestone hills lured this family in and their goal was a single minded one: to make great wines from the limestone rich soils here. Fast forward 20 years and Greystone is one of the great (and, some might say, yet to be fully discovered) wineries in this outstanding wine region. Not least due to the work of winemaker Dom Maxwell and general manager Nick Gill, who began working together in 2005 and has grown along with the brand and quality. 

Coleraine is the flagship wine of Te Mata Estate in Hawke’s Bay and is one of New Zealand’s most highly collectible and highly valued red wines. It was first made in 1989 as a single vineyard wine and has since forged a reputation for its long term ageability and great quality as a blend from valued vineyards in the hills of Havelock. This area is historically important in the New Zealand wine industry because it is home to some of the country's first grapevines ever planted in 1892. 

Coleraine vineyards    

The 2019 Coleraine was made from hand harvested grapes grown on several vineyards owned by Te Mata Estate, which were picked between 26 March and 10 April 2019.                                                                                                      

Each individual pick of grapes was destemmed before being given a traditional warm, plunged fermentation followed by extended maceration on skins. The resulting wines were then pressed mostly to new French oak barrels for 16 months of maturation with regular topping and racked. The blend was made in January 2020 and the finished wine was bottled in December 2020. 

Coleraine blend

Change is the only constant in Coleraine, which varies each year in terms of exact percentages of each grape variety used in the wine. It is always a blend of red grapes which traditionally come from Bordeaux in south west France. These varieties also do well in Hawke's Bay hot dry summer climate where balance is provided by the region's cool nights. 

The 2019 Coleraine is 59% Cabernet Sauvignon, 37% Merlot and 4% Cabernet Franc.                                                                                            

History of the wine and the name... Coleraine
The name Coleraine comes from the Coleraine vineyard situated on the land which is home of John and Wendy Buck of Te Mata Estate. John’s late grandfather was born in Coleraine in Northern Ireland, which originally inspired the name. 

The first vintage of Coleraine was in 1989 Coleraine has been an assemblage of the finest wines produced from distinct plots within Te Mata Estate’s oldest vineyards on the Havelock Hills.

Reviews for 2019 Coleraine

"An iconic brand meets a terrific vintage. The result is a “must have” wine for collectors and investors. This is elegance on a grand scale and one of the best vintages I’ve tasted. Still youthful and quite closed (it was bottled on the day I tasted it) but with plushness and power."  Bob Campbell. February 2021

Rays Road is Kumeu River’s new vineyard site in Hawkes Bay, planted on limestone soils at 180 metres above sea level, with a northerly aspect. The vineyard is dry farmed and this Chardonnay is made from 100% hand picked grapes, whole bunch pressed then fermented with wild yeasts in older French oak barrels. The result is a wine with  approachable and complex flavours, full of zesty citrus notes with a background minerality. On the palate, barrel maturation and malolactic fermentation has given this wine a richness and textural quality which is backed up by the wine’s great acidity, which provides it with good aging potential.

Kumeu River Wines began life as San Marino Wines in 1944 when Croatian immigrant couple, Mick and Katé Brajkovich, bought a small property with a vineyard on it. Their descendents now own and run Kumeu River Wines, which produces 250,000 bottles of wine annually from its owns 30 hectares of vineyards in Kumeu and from another 10 hectares, owned by local grape growers. 

This special library release is a one off which we have been lucky enough to secure a small amount of while featuring Palliser Estate as our winery of the month. This is the greatest dry aromatic white of the Palliser stable. It's fleshy, flavoursome and beautifully peachy buoyed up by the balance of great lime zest and a lingering citrusy finish. 

Dry Riesling is Palliser Estate's unsung hero white wine and this seven year old dry version is a stellar example. 

It's ripe and fleshy with beautiful balance provided by the citrusy acidity which adds length to this lovely wine. 

The grapes are grown on the organically certified Om Santi Vineyard and the Palliser Estate Vineyard.