This is the first release of this new wine from Greystone: the vineyard ferment Pinot Noir. They have been talking about their vineyard fermentations for a while: keen to make use of the wild yeast indigenous to their Waipara Valley vineyard, they’ve taken poly bins into the vineyard and conducted fermentations there. These experiments have been going since the 2012 vintage. But in past years these have been blended in with the Estate Pinot, or produced just as experimental bottlings. This is the first time they have released the wine commercially. 500 bottles have been released.
The wine was pressed quite early, and matured for 16 months in used oak. It’s unfined and unfiltered, and very little SO2 was added (30ppm was added in February 2017, after the wine had undergone a natural malolactic fermentation, and 20ppm was added in May 2017 before bottling in July).
You can see Dom Maxwell, Greystone winemaker, present about this wine to the 2017 Pinot conference in Wellington here.
Greystone Vineyard Ferment Pinot Noir 2016 Waipara Valley, New Zealand
14% alcohol. 576 bottles made. This is fabulous stuff. There’s just a slight lift on the floral cherry fruit nose with fine herbs, sweet red cherries and a hint of gaminess, adding a lovely savoury dimension. The palate is complex, sappy and really elegant with bright red cherry fruit but also a bit of raspberry bite, and a silky, smooth texture on the mid-palate. Compelling, balanced, detailed and complex. 95/100
