Browse Tag

marlborough

Barry

[vineyard]Goldwater 2006 Sauvignon Blanc (Marlborough) – Tropical green with just enough edge for freshness. It’s good, but this wine has lost something since its days as Dog Point; it’s got more Marlborough typicity, perhaps, but it’s lost the extras that lifted it just above the crowd. (4/08)

Crossings guard

[vineyard]The Crossings 2006 Pinot Noir (Marlborough) – Light, crisp red berries with a pleasant tarragon influence and faceted, whitish minerality. With its firm acidity, this might be a candidate for short-term aging, but I think it’s probably best-served by drinking over the near term, because the fruit is so fresh and appealing. (3/08)

Sauvignon rights

[label]Selaks “Premium Selection” 2006 Sauvignon Blanc (Marlborough) – Lots of minerality, dry, and restrained, showing good balance and a papery, leafy residue of apple skin. Austere to the point that it resembles the old style of Isabel (which is still marvelously ungenerous, but does it at a slightly higher volume than in the past). (5/07)

Pay the premium

Selaks “Premium Selection” 2006 Riesling (Marlborough) – Dry, dusty, and extremely austere on the nose. The palate, however, is a lot more interesting, showing a moment of cream followed by the sharp bite of sour orange acidity, grapefruit rind bitterness, and walnut skin. There’s good length, and while the wine “feels” mostly dry, a bit of residual sugar is there if you look hard enough…a grace note of softening sweetness at the end. A fair effort, though probably not with the complexity or stuffing to age more than a few years. (5/07)

Chahdinnaiy

Selaks “Premium Selection” 2005 Chardonnay (Marlborough) – Clove, nutmeg, and browned butter with Mandarin orange. Sultry brown apple joins the spicy fruit basket on the finish, which is a bit sticky. Before that, however, the wine seems in fair balance. Drink soon. (5/07)

Crossings guard

[vineyard]The Crossings 2006 Sauvignon Blanc (Marlborough) – Fine, well-managed sauvignon, with the zingy green “Marlboroughness” restrained just enough for polite company, leaving the structure and a hint of flaky minerality intact. There’s some fruit, but it’s not the soft, tropical sort that’s infecting the region’s cheaper bottlings…instead it’s crisp and green and quite fun. A good, solid wine right at the mean of the region’s style. (11/07)

Charles Babich

[bottle]Babich 2005 Riesling (Marlborough) – Varietally-solid riesling, on the big, ripe, lime-and-apple side. Hints of gooseberry intrude a bit – let’s pretend it’s the terroir – but this is a juicy, enjoyable wine. (10/07)

Original Seresin

[hand]Seresin 2005 Sauvignon Blanc (Marlborough) – One of the most polished and professional Marlborough sauvignons on the market. Bitter melon, lemongrass, intense lime and grapefruit, pomegranate, and acidity so vivid it’s palate-drying form the heart of this wine, but what’s striking is the confident, almost swaggering sophistication in the face of all that boisterous sauvignon-ness. Very, very good. (9/07)

Dog days

[marlborough]Dog Point 2005 Sauvignon Blanc (Marlborough) – Classic Marlborough “savvy” riding the rail between green, chile & herb exuberance and riper gooseberry and lightly tropical fruit, with fine acidity and poise. Not great, but certainly good. (8/07)

TN: Bury Goldwater

[vineyard]Goldwater 2005 Sauvignon Blanc (Marlborough) – Herbal and grassy. This gets past the underripe chile pepper and most (though not all) of the slightly underripe bell pepper, but doesn’t swing the other way into tropical sweetness, which is good. There’s some pear residue, which helps smooth things. That said, it’s a bit on the wan side. (4/07)