Nga Waka Martinborough Chardonnay 2018

Nga Waka Martinborough Chardonnay 2018"Weighty, textural Chardonnay with grapefruit, peach, ginger, bran biscuit and brioche flavours. A flavoursome wine with a nice mix of primary fruit with winemaking characters. Good now but could build greater complexity with a little bottle age" Bob Campbell, Master of Wine, Real Review, Aug 2019 Pale green gold in the glass. A rich, complex Martinborough Chardonnay showing intense ripe stone fruit flavours underpinned by subtle oak, malolactic and

"Weighty, textural Chardonnay with grapefruit, peach, ginger, bran biscuit and brioche flavours. A flavoursome wine with a nice mix of primary fruit with winemaking characters. Good now but could build greater complexity with a little bottle age" Bob Campbell, Master of Wine, Real Review, Aug 2019

Pale green/gold in the glass. A rich, complex Martinborough Chardonnay showing intense ripe stone fruit flavours underpinned by subtle oak, malolactic and barrel fermentation characters.

100% barrel fermented in tight-grain French oak barriques (20% new). All barrels lees-stirred monthly, with a total time in barrel of 10 months.

They started harvesting on the 17th of March (their earliest ever start) and finished with Home Block Chardonnay on the 5th of April (when they would normally be only just getting going!). The early finish was fortuitous as the rest of April was very wet. Quality-wise, the 2018 vintage is a significant step up on 2017 with ripeness at the higher end of the range and more expressive flavours. The February rain did knock the edge off phenolic ripeness so not quite the masterpiece they were hoping for earlier in the season but a very good vintage nonetheless. They are expecting generous-fruited, juicy wines to characterise the 2018 vintage.

In the vineyard they pride themselves on doing the little things well. Their vineyard management revolves around optimising sunlight on the leaves and bunches and low cropping levels to achieve concentrated, ripe flavours. Specific practices include training vines to the Vertical Shoot Positioning and Scott-Henry systems, bud and shoot thinning, correct shoot placement, leaf plucking and crop removal where necessary. They currently produce Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Riesling and Sauvignon Blanc from 17 hectares of vineyard.

Food Pairing: Perfectly suited to any lamb or white meat dish and will easily handle richer or creamier dishes as it has the fruit weight and texture to cut through the richness and complement those flavours.