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Harvest Detail:
100% hand picked
24/3 – 3/4/2005
Brix 24.6 to 24.7°
Total acidity 6.5 - 6.9 g/l
pH 3.73 – 3.77
Bottling Detail:
13.7% alcohol
5.4 g/l acidity
3.83 pH
Bottled July 2006
2002, 2003, 2004
Red meat, pork
2006 -2011
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Twice in 2006 awarded Trophies and Gold medals for Best Red Varietals, our 2005 Tempranillo is a great New Zealand example of the widely-grown Spainish red. It grows in a large range of climatic conditions and soil types and is best know as the main grape used for making Rioja. It is also used in Portugal under the synonym Tinta Roriz, where it is used to make port and also the Duero dry reds, with Touriga Nacional. We grow it in the stony, free-draining and warm soils of the Gimblett Gravels, the only Zealand winery producing this wine.
Tempranillo 92%, Touriga Nacional 8%
The Vineyard is situated in the Gimblett Gravels area. Soils consist of river shingle, deposited by the Ngaruroro River. These soils are extremely free draining and of low fertility, growing low vigour vines producing small crops of intensely coloured and flavoured grapes.
2005 was an excellent season in the Gimblett Gravels for Tempranillo. It’s early ripening nature, along with meticulous viticulture, enabled us to pick it ripe in outstanding condition. Tempranillo is the first of the red varieties that we harvest, a great advantage for us in Hawkes Bay, where sometimes the season can be cut short by rain.We have blended in a small percentage of the great Portuguese variety, Touriga Nacional (incredibly rare in NZ), which ripens much later in the season. This adds a dimension of Black Doris plum character to the wine, plus colour and tannin.
The hand harvested fruit was destemmed but not crushed. The fermentation took place in stainless fermenters, at ambient temperature. The cap was punched down or pumped over twice daily during the ferment. The must was pressed out as soon as the ferment was finished, with the wine settled for a few days and then racked to a mixture of new and older oak French and American oak barriques. Regular racking took place during the 14 month maturation in barrel. The wine was bottled in July 2006.
Ruby red with crimson
Wild raspberry and plum fruit aromas with spice with a little vanillin from oak barrels.
Fully ripened fruit from our temperate conditions does not produce jammy or porty characters as can happen in a hotter climate. Touriga Nacional adds depth, weight and complexity to the wine. This is an elegant wine, with firm but not heavy tannin structure. The texture is silky, but with substance, almost like a combination of Pinot Noir and Cabernet Sauvignon. There is great persistence of the wild fruit flavours on the finish.
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