There was an unusually tense feeling in the crowd that had gathered for this tasting with AuZone - the wine society. Many of us had looked forward to this one - a duel between Burgundy and New Zealand - for quite a while. The weapons: three bottles each of red wine made from Pinot Noir. The question was simply who was going to kick whom? Would the classical wines from Bourgogne easily beat the shit out of their antipodean counterparts or would the deeper fruit in the wines from the southern hemisphere win due to their more immediate charm.We were about to be able to make that judgment now. The two teams were chosen by the two organizers of the event. the only rule being that the average price of the three bottles could not be more than 400 SEK, about 45 Euros or USD 70. Our task was to rank them from the best to the least appreciated and then cast our votes.
the wines we tasted were:
2003 Waipara Springs Reserve, Waipara Valley, Canterbury, NZ
Medium deep red with a little denser core
Warm, rather developed, meaty nose with loads of smoking wood fire. Spicy and charming. Good Pinot fruit.
Fresh, delicious attack with a nice, juicy acidity. Wood fire and charm again. Not to heavy, a bit dry tannins. Ending a bit dry and acidic. Good maturation. I guessed Bourgorgne...
2005 Savigny les Beaune aux Clous 1er cru, Domaine d’Ardhuy, Bourgogne
Rather deep red with a slightly purple rim.
A bit closed, dusty nose, but dense and with a dark, slightly aromatic cherry fruit. Nice oak and chocolate notes. Allspice and slightly gamey.
Fresh and clean attack. Dense. Fresh acidity. Fiery and with strong notes of toasted oak. marked, coarse and dry tannins that gives the wine a dry, coarse and earthy finish. Powerful and in the need to be laid down for some years. Probably closing up right now. NZ was my guess.
2000 Corton Bressandes, Comte Senard, Bourgogne
Light brick red. Beautiful mature colour. Sadly the nose immediately shows the tell tale signs of a heavily cork tainted wine. Vegetal and unpleasant. Impossible to judge what might have been behind that TCA smell.
2006 Te Muna Road, Craggy Range, Martinborough, NZ
Medium deep reddish purple with a pale rim.
Deep nose with sweet, red strawberry and cherry fruit. Quite a bit of pinosity. A little jammy. Fruit driven and clean, but maybe not the most complex nose.
Fresh and clean attack. Refreshing acidity. Dense, aromatic fruit. Quite a bit of tannins that are well embedded in the fruit. long, fiery finish. The fruit and the embedded tannins led me correctly to New Zeeland this time. It seems like I'm getting better at this!
2004 Felton Road, Block 3, Central Otago, NZ
Rather dense, red colour with a darker core and some signs of development.
Classy, deep and charming nose. Developed with gamey notes of meat. Smoking wood, pinosity and loads of shit. Delicious and impressive!
Very fresh attack with sweet, delicious fruit and tasty wood notes. Broad, charming taste. Smoke. Fresh, chewy acidity and a little sweetness. Quite a lot of well structured tannins that are nicely embedded on the sweetish fruit. Long, spicy and charming aftertaste. Really good wine!
1993 Volney-Santenots-du-Milieu, Comtes Lafon, Bourgogne
Dense, dark red colour with brick coloured rim.
A bit lean but dense and meaty nose. Some alcohol sting in the nose. Dark, ripe strawberry fruit and dark chocolate.
Very fresh, almost acidic attack. Very fresh, acidity driven style with dry, dominant tannins that kills the fruit in the aftertaste. Fiery, dry and peppery. Coarse and unbalanced with lack of Pinot-charm.
So, the result of the jury? Surprisingly for most, except maybe for Erik, the Kiwis really kicked butt with their Burgundian counterparts. The three Kiwi wines came out first, second and third! A rather embarrassing defeat for Burgundy. Although only one of the NZ wines, the Felton Road, had a screw cap, it felt significant that the corked wine came from Burgundy, and also frustrating, since the corked Corton might very well have been a wine that could have given the antipodeans a match. Maybe one could argue that it was a bit odd that Ansgar, who was the leader for the Burgundy team, only had chosen wines from Côte de Beaune. Perhaps the upper price limit was a limiting factor here.
Anyway, a most interesting tasting with a, for us lovers of New Zealand's Pinot Noirs, very clear and satisfying result. It was also interesting to note the rather rapid development of these wines. the clear winner of the night, Felton Road's '04, was rather mature and is probably not for and prolonged cellaring. But then, we don't have much experience of how these wines will continue to age. Anyway, it will be very interesting to follow their further development.
In the end, we got an extra wine which was distinctly aged, eventually clear mushroom notes evolved, that lead me to think of mature Nebbiolo. We did, however, guess Pinot Noir, and it was a Russian Pinot Noir, probably from somewhere near Crimea. We were told that the father of the producer had brought home cutting of Pinot after the war (which one?). A fun wine, but also good that it was given us for free!
Here's the line-up:
Cheers, Anders
