Here's a surprising fact - nearly one third of Germany's vineyards are planted in red grapes – but until quite recently most of these wines were made specifically with the country's own tastes in mind.

Now there is a generation of winemakers producing riper, fuller bodied Pinot Noirs made in a modern style - and one which takes both Burgundy and New Zealand Pinot Noir styles into account. Winemaker Gerd Stepp is at the forefront of this cultural change and this fabulous Pinot Noir illustrates this in this savoury, smooth and finely tuned Pinot Noir, which tastes like the ultimate match with roast duck or aubergine and then again, is equally beautiful on its own. 

This is a thought provoking Pinot Noir which offers exceptional value for money.

The fruit contained a mix of four Pinot Noir clones – 777, 115, Abel & UCD5. Fruit was spilt into three fermenters – one containing 100% whole bunch, 70% whole bunch, and the other 100% de-stemmed. Fermented with natural yeast. Gentle winemaking techniques were used to avoid excessive extraction. 23 days on skin, pressed to 100% old French oak barrels. 12 months in barrel, and allowed to undergo malolactic fermentation naturally in spring, before being racked and allowed to naturally settle and integrate in tank. Unfined and unfiltered.

Hand Harvested: 6th and 12th April 2021
Bottled: 8th June 2022
pH: 3.69
TA: 5.9g/L
Alcohol: 13.5% v/v

Fromm -  "A bright and pure Pinot with good fruit weight and sweet spicy undertones. Layered and harmonious with a structural complexity yet offering lovely drink now approach-ability."

Smooth earthy flavours intermingle with dark cherry flavours in this new Pinot Noir which is made with grapes grown on a well established, older vineyard site which has a new lease of life, in the centre of Martinborough. The 3.5 hectare vineyard was established by the Brodies who sold it to Eva and Ross Mackay in 2018. The new name is Dublin Street Wines, the first vintage being from the high quality 2019 vintage followed by the great 2020 one. Both years were beautifully high quality ones for wine with dry settled weather, which produced great quality grapes that translated into very good wines. 

The vineyard is entirely devoted to Pinot Noir and planted with five different clonal variations (114, 115, 667, 777 and 5). 

The aim of the game now is to reduce oak use in the wines, replacing it with whole bunch and wild yeast fermentations; two winemaking tools that can accentuate structure and savoury flavour aspects, without dominating. 

This is Chard Farm's Cromwell 'village' pinot noir made from their Estate Vineyards in the Cromwell Basin; Lowburn, Gibbston and Parkburn.

WINEMAKERS COMMENTS
Expressive, complex bouquet with sweet floral notes, coupled with swirls of ripe cherry, plum fruits and aromatic spice. Ample freshness and velvety tannins lead to a palate that is elegant, satisfying and highly drinkable.

Dark crimson in colour, this wine is brooding with a rich, bold, and powerful bouquet of savoury red berry fruit, aromas of sweet raspberries, framboise liqueur and sweet vanilla. Lush, juicy, and very appealing savoury tannins give the wine great texture.

We expect this wine to reward careful cellaring over 7-10 years.

This is an excellent value Wairarapa Pinot Noir. The grapes are carefully selected to create a great New Zealand Pinot with a medium body and a fruit forward and complex palate.  

Full bodied, earthy and superbly well structured Pinot Noir for now and the cellar. Runholder is one of our favourite full bodied Martinborough Pinot Noirs with spicy structured flavours of black plums, dark macerated cherries and smoky mushrooms with notes of cedar and pronounced oak. 

Runholder is made with grapes grown on the Te Kairanga Home and McLeod vineyards, which were destemmed grapes then fermented in stainless and aged in French oak for 10 months for structured, smoothness and a velvety texture. 

Winemaker John Kavanagh is one of the top Pinot Noir makers in Martinborough and has a long track record of outstanding Pinots from both this region and also in Nelson, in his former role at Neudorf Vineyards. 

TK Runholder is dry as a bone with .29 grams of residual sugar per litre. It's made from seven clones of Pinot Noir: Abel, 777, 6, 5, 115, 667 and 828.

Mon Cheval is a small family owned wine brand in the Waipara Valley, which is the heart of the North Canterbury wine scene - one of New Zealand's highest quality Pinot Noir regions.

This Pinot Noir is one of our favourites and comes from Wellington's closest wine region, the Wairarapa; Gladstone, to be precise, where winemaker Karl Johner has what you might call a foot in both camps. The German born winemaker produces wine at his winery in Gladstone in the New Zealand summer. In our winter, he hot foots it back to Germany to work harvest at his winery there.

The wines from both places are classic, elegant expressions of aromatic grape varieties; high points are Pinot Noir, Riesling and Pinot Gris; made in a range of styles.

This Pinot Noir is a dry, medium bodied, earthy and smooth. Bottled unfined and unfiltered. This wine ticks the vegan friendly box.

Escarpment fashions Pinot Noir from the Martinborough district in New Zealand. Part of our ethos is to explore boundaries and create wines of interest and complexity.

W I N E M A K E R S   N O T E

The Noir label brings together over three decades of wine making experience, creating a soft, bright, fruit forward wine which can be enjoyed immediately or will cellar successfully for several years. Made using traditional techniques from fruit grown on the Martinborough terrace. The fruit was destemmed into open top vessels and fermented using indigenous yeast. After an average vat time of 20 days the wine was pressed off and aged in predominately older French barriques for 10 months. Bottled without fining or filtration, the resulting wine is a blend of 24 individual parcels. Structure and texture sit perfectly with ripe fruit flavours and gentle tannins that combine with intriguing complexity. Enjoy with many types of cuisine or cellar confidently for up to 5 years.

T A S T I N G 

Bright ruby red in colour, the wine opens with lifted perfume and fresh summer berries. An elegant vintage has given us softness and focus. It is very fragrant and attractive with fresh red berries, underpinned with turned earth, subtle spice and savoury notes, which add to complexity. The fresh berries continue on the palate with ripe cranberry, fresh cherry and strawberry, creating a bright vibrancy and crunchie freshness. Soft, fine-grained tannin also intertwine on the palate, creating texture and poise. This is an attractive wine that is immediately appealing but will also reward with a few years in the cellar. Serve at 16°C and enjoy with any red meat and rich pasta dishes, or as a perfect accompaniment to a barbeque.

Beautiful bright black cherries are captured in a structured full bodied Pinot Noir with delicacy and light notes of earth, spice and summer berries. This is the best Whitehaven Pinot Noir yet, made mostly from grapes grown in Marlborough's Southern Valley sub-region.  A stunner and incredibly good value for money. 

This wine drinks beautifully now (in 2024) and will certainly age well for at least five years. 

Whitehaven Wines began life in 1994 as a romantic business for a couple of corporate escapees, Sue and Greg White, who had given up life in the rat race of Auckland for another kind of life aboard their yacht. When sailing around the country, they took shelter in the Marlborough Sounds from Pacific storms and fell in love with the region. An easy thing to do when harbouring in the spectacularly pristine waters of the Sounds. They decided to settle there on terra firma once more and try their hands at wine production, hiring a winemaker and beginning a business which has now been around for 26 years. Greg has sadly passed away now, leaving a legacy as well as his wife and daughter, Sam, to run the winery. Their winemaker is Peter Jackson.

Pinot Noir is the jewel in the crown of the evocatively named Mount Beautiful Wines and this producer makes several different styles.

This is the signature wine, made in the highest volumes and from a very different vintage; 2018, which was warmer, more humid and earlier than any other year on record with hand harvesting of the grapes starting 10 days earlier than usual on 21 March. For the 2018 vintage, 100% of the grapes were destemmed and the wine was gently plunged twice daily. This PInot Noir was aged in French oak, 20% new, for 11 months.

It's a ripe, fruit driven Pinot Noir with earthy flavours and represents great value for money.