Batch Winery Thomas Waiheke Island Blanc de Gris NV $50 Paired with: Annabelle Langbein’s Provencal egg salad in the NZ Herald July 8th 2023 My first instinct when confronted by creamy, mustardy, eggy goodness is to reach for a great sparkling wine. Now loads of proper, grown-up, wine-and-food-folk say that prosecco or cava are the … Read More
Waiheke Island
Batch Thomas Legacy Waiheke Island Pinot Gris 2019
Batch Thomas Legacy Waiheke Island Pinot Gris 2019 $74 My sister is a very good schoolteacher. From an early age, she was remarkably committed to finding ways of telling people what to do and how to do it. I once called her ‘bossy’. She said she couldn’t help being ‘aggressively helpful’. So I bought her … Read More
Dunleavy ‘The Strip’ Single Vineyard Waiheke Island Cabernet Merlot 2018
Dunleavy ‘The Strip’ Single Vineyard Waiheke Island Cabernet Merlot 2018 $45 The vineyard producing the cabernet sauvignon and merlot for this wine sits adjacent to the old Waiheke Island airstrip, you can almost smell the leather pilots’ jackets, smoke and oil-soaked earth alongside its rich plum, blackberry and dark cocoa characters. The acidity is refreshing, … Read More
Goldie Estate Waiheke Island Syrah 2016
Goldie Estate Waiheke Island Syrah 2016 $44 Heinrich Storm not only has the most fierce name in all of New Zealand winemaking, he’s also young, bouncy and ferociously talented on the syrah front. Four years on since vintage and this delicious thing is beginning to move on from the trot and break into a canter … Read More
Goldie Estate Waiheke Island Merlot Cabernet 2018
Goldie Estate Waiheke Island Merlot Cabernet 2018 $26 Super-bright and berry driven, this merlot cabernet blend is ferociously flavoursome on the fruit-front (that’s my alliteration quota filled for this note) and I’m a huge fan of its mid-palate textures. It’s like a gentle giant of a wine, plush and velvety, but big on personality. Nicely … Read More
Tantalus Hawke’s Bay Rosé 2018
Tantalus Hawke’s Bay Rosé 2018 $39 While Tantalus are one of THE places to be and be seen on Waiheke Island, their winemaking team like to mix things up a tad, of an occasion, when the opportunity presents itself. They’ve managed to secure fruit from one of their trusted vineyards in Hawke’s Bay and created … Read More
Little Wing Waiheke Island Marsanne 2019
Little Wing Waiheke Island Marsanne 2019 $39.90 How could they resist the lure of a semi-abandoned, oceanfront vineyard on Waiheke Island? Young travelling winemakers Gillian and Gareth MacLachlan became obsessed with marsanne after working in the Northern Rhône in 2010 – and hoped to find the spot where they could (literally) put down roots back … Read More
Obsidian Waiheke Island Pinot Gris 2019
Obsidian Waiheke Island Pinot Gris 2019 $30 Hands up if you’ve been hunting high and low for a pinot gris that’s both lusciously sweetish up front, yet finishes deliciously dry and long. The team at Obsidian have cracked it well and truly. With nashi pear niceness, lemonade apple and baked quince characters which merge into … Read More
Little Wing Waiheke Island Syrah 2016
Little Wing Waiheke Island Syrah 2016 $60 This is Gillian and Gareth MacLachlan’s red riot. They became obsessed with Syrah after working in the Northern Rhone in 2010, so when the opportunity came along to purchase a semi-abandoned oceanfront vineyard on Waiheke Island years later, of course syrah was compulsory! Planted on heavy clays, super-close … Read More
Mudbrick Reserve Waiheke Island Syrah 2018
Mudbrick Reserve Waiheke Island Syrah 2018 $75 I honestly couldn’t tell you the last time I tasted a syrah that was so young yet sang so beautifully on the palate. Winemaker Patrick Newton has woven some witchcraft with what’s quite clearly plump, flavour-stacked fruit, to produce an ultra-velvety syrah, stitched together with cracked pepper, boysenberries, … Read More
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