Chardonnay rules

Pinot and sauvignon drinkers take note - chardonnay retains its crown as the queen of white wines. Foodstyle Review talks with Villa Maria’s group wine maker Alastair Maling about chardonnay’s long life with wine drinkers and the diverse regional styles throughout the country.

Media reports on the demise of chardonnay don’t live up to the facts – the chardonnay drinking faithful keep this grape popular at home while export volumes over the past two years have been stable. 

In the Air New Zealand Wine Awards 2009, organised by Kiwi wine growers and the country’s largest annual wine competition, the Villa Maria group took home 15 gold medals from a total of 100 gold awards in a field of over 1650 wine entries. Significantly, over half of these gold medals were for the group’s reserve and single vineyard chardonnays. 

“Judges were particularly favourable towards our chardonnays, with wines from every one of Villa Maria’s key chardonnay grape growing regions – from Hawkes Bay, to Gisborne and Marlborough – represented in the gold-medal line-up,” iterates Villa Maria group wine maker Alastair Maling. 

In the face of a growing popularity for aromatic wines, there is a resurgence of chardonnay, he says, as it evolves with more styles. This grape has survived drinking fashions as it is all about diversity. 

“We have so many regional aspects to different chardonnay styles on top of the intervention of the wine maker whose options are very diverse.” 

Grown here for over three decades now, chardonnay has weathered a few palate fashions. In the 1970s, when our wines and labels mimicked ‘European’ styles, chardonnay was picked early and made into simple ‘dry whites’ that lacked complexity. In the 1980s John Hancock of Morton Estate in Hawke’s Bay took chardonnay in a new direction with barrel fermentation and malolactic fermentation. 

The varietal chardonnays of this period did tend to be big on alcohol, oak and buttery flavours from over eager use of malolactic fermentation where tart, green apple tasting malic acid, naturally present in grape must, is converted to soft, buttery (and sometimes flabby) tasting lactic acid that fills out wine and also gives a lovely golden colour. It also helps to mature the wine more quickly. 

“There was probably too much oak in hindsight, although people did love it. We have moved on to subtle flavours where the fresh fruit comes to the fore.” 

Public tastes have also become more varied and winemaking is evolving styles to suit different consumer tastes, says Maling. 

“We are looking at more complexity, less winemaking influence, more age-ability and natural acidity.” 

Which means winemakers are letting the regional characteristics of the grapes take their influence. 

The chardonnay grape has also changed over the decades. In the early days, clone 6 was the most widely planted chardonnay and these grapes are now used mostly for sparkling wines, replaced by clone 95 and clone 15 for fine chardonnay making. Nor is the Mendoza chardonnay varietal as popular as it was in the 1980s. Its grape clusters produce berries both small and big and with different ripening times which makes picking difficult. 

Having weathered the climate, the mature chardonnay grapes on the vine offer any winemaker with a lot of options: Hand or machine harvested; natural fermentation through wild yeasts or inoculation with chardonnay yeasts (wild yeast leaves a distinctive nutty flavour); cool or warm fermentation; fermentation on solids or racked clear; malolactic fermentation or not; new or old oak, or a combination of the two; and length of ageing? 

“We tend to try and let the fruit and the vineyard do the talking,” says Maling. 

The regions 

The main chardonnay growing regions are Marlborough, Hawkes Bay, Gisborne Auckland and Northland. As the cooler of these regions, Marlborough produces grapes with a higher natural acidity and more citrus lemon flavours. Because of the natural fresh fruit acidity malolatic is common to bring those acid levels back in balance. With the tightness of the local fruit, oaking is usually subtle. Marlborough has the widest temperature diversity of any wine region in New Zealand. 

Depending on the location of the vineyard Hawkes’ Bay chardonnays can display more stone fruit and melon flavours. Some vineyards are more sheltered than others and enjoy more heat. Gimblett Gravels wines, for instance, have a richer fruit style; whereas wineries along State Highway 50 are more acidic due to the cooler climate. 

Gisborne is the chardonnay capital of New Zealand with the country’s biggest flavours, particularly from vineyard on the northern slopes, high above the frosts. Plenty of sun and fertile soils produce big chard with delicious tropical fruit flavours, such as pineapple and banana. Vintages are susceptible to cyclone weather bombs in February and March, just before harvest.

Auckland chardonnays reflect the complex weather patterns in this ‘thin’ land region surrounded by two oceans. With its maritime climate in a good mood (frosts can be a big problem), Auckland can produce some stunningly subtle chard. 

From a general view, the 2006 chardonnay vintage around the country was of average to low quality with low yields; the 2007 vintage benefited from great growing conditions; and the 2008 year was very challenging with the Hawkes Bay and Gisborne flowering down, resulting in a reduced grape crop. 

Tastings 

Maling opened some top Villa Maria (VM) samples that demonstrate regional differences, starting with the VM single vineyard Taylors Pass Chardonnay 2006, an excellent example of what Marlborough is capable of producing with the winemaker on the right side of weather gods.

Taylors Pass is a low yielding vineyard on north side of Awatere River and is located in a nice warm and secluded spot. This is a chardonnay for old school drinkers – a V12 of a chard from a region that normally produces a lot of delicate wines suitable for moped riders and association cheese tastings. 

This vineyard produces consistently ripe fruit and 2006 was drier year than normal. The grapes were hand-picked, ‘whole bunch’ pressed, fermented with wild yeast and matured in good French oak (25 percent new and the rest seasoned) on lees for 12 months. The lovely rich and complex layers of fruit in this chard have been awarded three gold medals since its release – its natural yeast providing a distinctive bouquet and a nutty taste. Maling says this is one of his favourite VM wines. 

The 2007 year was a good one for wine making in Hawke’s Bay and the Villa Maria single vineyard Keltern chardonnay 2007 is a cracker, V8 of a chard and with flavours that will get better through to 2014. The winery is located on Highway 50 and the 2007 year enjoyed a cool, dry February pre-harvest and the grapes (very low cropping at 2.5 kg per vine) were fermented with wild yeast. Half of the juice was put through malolactic fermentation and the result won gold at the 2008 Air NZ Awards and five stars from Cuisine magazine. 

Next, we sampled a VM Gisborne Barrique 2007 that had already won three wine trophies. Use of the term ‘barrique’ is a marketing hangover from the 1980s and originates from a smallish (225 litre) French oak barrel used for fermentation and aging of both red and white wine that is commonly used these days in ‘New World’ wine making. 

To keep up the car analogy, the VM Gisborne Barrique 2007 is a Porsche of a wine – powerful with a lot of finesse – much more finesse than the company thought could come out of Gisborne, says Maling. Gisborne enjoyed near perfect wine growing weather in 2007, and this wine was made from a small western, hand-cared vineyard. The finished wine is a blend of clone 95 which provides the citrus flavours and Mendoza, which ripens earlier and provides the tropical flavours. On the mid-palate are lovely creamy cashew flavours and with a flinty mineral finish. This wine will get more complex over the next five years, says Maling. 

We drink chardonnay too young 

“Please age your chardonnay,” pleads Maling. 

“It’s a shame we are so used to drinking the recent vintages that we forget what five to seven years of aging does to a good chardonnay – a huge amount of interest and complexity.” 

Screw topped bottles age slower than corked bottled he says, but most of our chardonnay is 10 times better when aged. 

“Immature chardonnay can taste mealy and green, while an older one creamy and nutty.” 

As a varietal chardonnay will retain its status among Kiwi wine drinkers he adds. 

“Food matching is one of the reasons I think this variety keeps as popular as it does. It is very versatile with a range of food, especially seafood and chicken.” 

Then there is demand from overseas markets for Kiwi chard. 

“When you look at exports sales they are steady. Some varietals will come and go but I think chardonnay will always be here.” 

Summer 2009

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