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Winetopia dates confirmed

Winetopia is now in its seventh year and the two day event is packed with fun, food, music and talks as well as informal wine tastings, masterclasses and live music. The events include regular 15 minute sessions of wine options, an informal  guessing game on a mini scale, designed to allow wine lovers of all levels to have a shot at checking how well their knowledge stacks up in recognising aromas and flavours in well known wine styles.There will be approximately 250 wines at each event and...

Tuesday wine talk with Judy Finn of Neudorf Vineyards

Weekly wine talk is usually published every Friday but this week’s appears today due to the following week being on annual leave (at a yoga and fasting retreat). This great interview with Judy Finn took place today but is based on over two decades of having known and followed the wines that she and her partner in life and in wine, Tim Finn, produce in Nelson.This high achieving couple own Neudorf Vineyards, which they  founded in 1978 in Nelson's Moutere Hills, an enclave of excellence wh...

Russian vodka banned and replaced with Ukranian flag

The West Auckland Trust will remove thousands of bottles of Russian vodka and beer from its 26 stores today and replace them with the Ukrainian flag. The West Auckland Trusts owns 26 retail stores as well as hospitality venues throughout the region and will stop selling thousands of Russian made products from today in a move to show solidarity with Ukraine.The empty shelf space will display a Ukrainian flag, says Allan Pollard, Trusts chief executive officer."The immediate removal of Russian vod...

What does well aged wine taste like?

Pegasus Bay winery in North Canterbury has released three aged wines onto the market, all of them drawn from the temperature controlled cellars at the winery.The wines are part of the company’s Aged Release programme, which began in 2006 with wines that were 10 years old at the time. This year’s new Aged Release trio of wines includes the 2012 Pegasus Bay Pinot Noir, 2012 Pegasus Bay Riesling and 2012 Pegasus Bay Prima Donna Pinot Noir; an aptly named wine which is a blend of the best tastin...

Where can I find a good Pinot Noir? Six top drops

“I find Pinot Noir a bit of a mixed bag and it’s not always easy finding a good one – can you help?” It’s a common question from readers of this blog, friends and family, and it's a question that is usually answered with a “Yes and sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings, but it nearly always relates to price. Pinot simply isn’t cheap to produce so it’s rarely going to deliver excellence at a low price, despite a slowly growing range of very good wines under $25 and, occasionally e...

Friday drinks in Marlborough

Was it a punk streak or a craving for freedom? Possibly a bit of both led Hans and Therese Herzog to move to New Zealand in 1994 from Switzerland where restrictive Swiss wine laws meant they were unable to plant unauthorized grapes for many years, such as Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Sauvignon Blanc instead of the uninspiring Muller Thurgau. The Swiss Government did liberalise its restrictive laws on grape varieties but the challenging Swiss climate remained, as did Hans’ dream to find more favo...

Digging the dirt on a new cellar door

Architectural drawing of the new Nga Waka cellar door from Vicky Read at Aspect Architecture...

Friday wine with Dom Maxwell of Greystone

Here is Dom Maxwell’s story. Bored at his desk job and in love with being outside led Dom Maxwell to his consider a career in winemaking because he was kindling the first flames of his passion for wine, when living in the UK. He is now the winemaker at Greystone Winery in North Canterbury, a place he began work in October 2004, initially in the vineyards there. Prior to that, he studied a one year post graduate  viticulture and oenology degree at Lincoln University. His first degree, s...

Woman in wine, Jane Hunter…

She took over Hunter’s Wines as owner and managing director in 1987 after the untimely death of her husband Ernie, who founded the winery in 1978; early days for quality wine in this country. Prior to her role at Hunter’s Wines, Jane was head of viticulture at Montana Wines. She has was born in South Australia and has a degree in Agricultural Science from the University of Adelaide. Her leadership and ownership of Hunter’s Wines has seen the company grow to at least five times its origi...

Woman in wine, Celia Hay

Celia Hay is the founder of the New Zealand School of Food & Wine, which she courageously relocated to Auckland after the 2011 Christchurch earthquake. This unexpected shake put paid to both the building and the business she ran from it in the South Island’s biggest city, so she bravely put her three children and a bunch of banana boxes full of their personal possessions in the car and headed for the hills – the Bombay Hills. She has since forged a reputation as a food and wine educa...

Monday afternoon vino with Neal Ibbotson

The biggest extravagance and the best investment that Neal Ibbotson ever made was the engagement ring he bought for his wife, Judy, who shares in the life of Saint Clair Family Estate, one of New Zealand’s biggest and most successful wine producers. He got into the wine industry aged 50 and doesn’t do regrets but, if he did, it would be not getting into winemaking earlier. His mother lived to be 104. She was the inspiration behind the eponymous sparkling wine, Dawn, one of New Zealand’s...

Friday morning drinks with Tony Bish, king of Chardonnay

If Tony Bish has anything to do with his own reincarnation, he says he would like to come back as a game changer. Some might say he has already achieved this admirable trait by forging a name for himself as Hawke’s Bay’s king of Chardonnay and in building a family business in one of Napier’s most iconic and once neglected buildings, the National Tobacco Company at Ahuriri. He loathes greenness in wine, loves humility in people and has a life time motto to live life to the full because, ...

Monday morning wine with Ed Donaldson

Getting to know the people behind the wines and learning about their journeys can be as interesting as New Zealand’s best wines taste, which was the inspiration for this interview. It’s the third in a new series on this website, delving into the people behind the scenes. The following is a refreshing take on wine from the multi talented Ed Donaldson, whose taste in music and food is as legendary as his palate. Ed is the marketing manager and third eldest of four sons of the Donaldson fami...

Friday morning wine with Duncan Forsyth

Lifelong friends, a bloody Mary and a slushy machine all rate highly for Duncan Forsyth, of Mount Edward Winery in Central Otago. He was the first in New Zealand to sell high quality Pinot Noir on tap to restaurants. He rates southern Spain as his favourite wine region, among a couple of other regions, and finds working from home to be a bit of a distraction but life and work go on, as he shares this Friday morning in this website’s new wine take on the famous Proust questionnaire, which or...

Rapaura Springs puts Sauvignon’s best foot forward

Rapaura Springs is a winery owned by Ian and Rosemary Wiffin, Margaret and Brendan Neylon and John Neylon. The Neylon family have been instrumental pioneers in Marlborough’s green lip mussel industry and also now own substantial vineyard land in Rapaura and Dillons Point in Marlborough. They describe their vineyard land as prime and their top wines support this assertion with consistently high quality, dry styles and  medium to full bodied styles. This week I tasted their four new Sauv...

Friday wine with Malcolm Rees-Francis

It’s nine days into nationwide lockdown in New Zealand and  Central Otago winemaker Malcolm Rees-Francis is living in alternate states of thankfulness and disbelief, in between being interviewed for this chat about life, the state of the world and wine. “The sin is being boring,” he told me, of what makes a wine unappealing, adding that he would rather have a bad wine than a boring one because there is no hook for your interest and your brain or for your tastebuds. Here, Malcolm ta...

Riesling around the world – tasting 23 September (and wine of the week)

After a week of pointless travelling up and down the North Island, it’s easy to lose heart, especially with full lockdown back in place so I’m grateful for the reminder to be grateful and today’s gratitude comes for the sunshine and my favourite white grape variety. Riesling is near to my heart and the theme of a tasting that I am lucky enough to host on Thursday 23 September at 6pm at Regional Wines & Spirits in Wellington. It’s also the reason for today’s work (‘work’) in...

Homage to a friend

It’s a bittersweet day. Thankful for the warmth of the sun’s rays and chilled by the wind, I am reminded by both of a friend who chose to say goodbye this week. He kept popping in to work to say hi and suggest a catch up. We used to catch up often but life gets in the way. I moved. He had plans to buy a house nearby at one stage. I kept meaning to touch base and earlier this week I planned to call and finally arrange that catch up. Turns out I was too late. I can’t help but feel sad for...

Five Pinot Noirs to see you through lockdown

It’s International Pinot Noir Day and there is plenty to celebrate here in New Zealand, despite being back in Alert level 4 lockdown. The announcement of the latest lockdown saw wine sales spike within 10 minutes online as well as in stores throughout this country. I was standing in store at the Hamilton Beer & Wine Co when the announcement came through and customers buying wine weren’t heading for the cheap and cheerful but for high  quality bottles; “I want to enjoy something rea...

Great dirt from Esk Valley news and reviews

Great Dirt is a great name and I’m not going to beat around the bush; the Great Dirt Syrah is one of the red wine highlights of my year so far. It’s been a tough one for many, not least for the winery that has just launched this evocatively named new wine brand, Esk Valley, which is part of Villa Maria Wines. Winemaker Gordon Russell started at Esk in 1993 and has since forged a reputation for making a wide range of wines from the quirky (Chenin Blanc and Verdelho) to the mainstream with&...

Writers share their trade secrets

Hamilton Book Month is here and I am flattered to be taking part as the panel chair with a bunch of fellow wine writers at the Hamilton Beer & Wine Co next Wednesday 18 August from 6.30pm to 8.30pm. If you’ve ever wondered how an accountant becomes a wine writer or how a wine writer remains sober during day time hours, pop along and join us. Bookings are required for this event, which will see four of us chat about our best two wines up to $35 in value – and share them with those who...

Wild Canterbury Pinot pushes beautiful boundaries

I’d heard vicious rumours of dry July but it must’ve been somewhere else because Martinborough was extremely wet last month and so were the insides of my wine glass. One of the best wines of the month was a wild ferment Pinot Noir from a region that is among my go-to, all time favourite places when it comes to drop dead deliciously good wines, most of which are made by small, family owned producers. That place is North Canterbury. And this pre amble is my segue into a long awaited review ...

Paper Nautilus new release

There’s nothing like a massive writing deadline to put paid to nearly everything else in life and with the deadline looming faster than bears thinking about, I am extremely focussed on creating a good read and obsessively researching to ensure the facts are on the nail as well. The new project will be revealed in the fullness of time and in the meantime, here is last week’s blog, intended to be published on Friday but with a deadline hanging over me like a dark cloud, well, sorry, it’s ...

The Chenin mystery, a wine of the week

Joelle Thomson’s weekly column is published on Fridays. The decline of Chenin in New Zealand remains a mystery 11 June 2021 South African wines made headlines in one of the most respected newspapers in the world this year because of a relatively obscure grape variety, Chenin Blanc, which can hold its own with the finest white wines, wrote UK critic Jancis Robinson MW in the Financial Times last month. It will come as good news to South Africa’s winemakers whose industry has had it tough...

Four shades of Otago Pinot from Valli

Grant Taylor, founder and owner of Valli Vineyards, is one of the most interesting creators of Central Otago Pinot Noir. There are four different Pinot Noirs made every year but there are no tiers in the range, although no doubt there are plenty of tears in frosty years because Central is the most southern wine region in the world and can be rather chilly. My wine of the week is arguably the edgiest of the four and that’s what I love about it. Reviews of the other three Pinots still to come...