Wine
Vintage stars
by Michael Cooper
Expressions of taste from boutique wineries.
Two producers – Bilancia in Hawke’s Bay and Gibbston Valley in Central Otago – have recently released standout wines, full of flavour and personality.
Lorraine Leheny and Warren Gibson launched their Bilancia label a decade ago, but still produce only a few thousand cases a year, because Gibson is a full-time senior winemaker at Trinity Hill. When they made their first wines, the couple didn’t own a property, a vineyard or winery, which created a challenge when choosing a name for the venture. Bilancia (pronounced ‘‘be-larn-cha’’) is Italian for ‘‘balance’’ or ‘‘harmony’’, the key qualities they seek to achieve in their wines.
Bilancia Hawke’s Bay Pinot Gris 2007 ($27) is a full-bodied wine with rich pear, lychee and spice flavours and a dry, well-rounded finish. From lower-cropping vines, harvested with higher sugar levels in the grapes, Bilancia Reserve Pinot Grigio 2007 ($34) is highly scented and mouth-filling, with a sliver of sweetness amid its deliciously concentrated flavours of peaches, spices and apricots.
Why is one wine labelled “pinot gris” and the other “pinot grigio”? Leheny and Gibson are fans of Italian wines, and until recently labelled both wines as pinot grigio – the Italian name for the variety the French call pinot gris. In other countries, however, pinot gris is often used for sturdy, rich, rounded wines produced in the traditional style of Alsace, whereas lighter, crisper wines, in the mould of those from northern Italy, are called pinot grigio.
During a recent export trip to Australia, when Leheny told a customer that Bilancia’s pinot grigios are full-bodied and rich, she was unfairly accused of mislabelling. The couple have now abandoned the idea of calling their wines pinot grigio and all future vintages will be labelled pinot gris.
Syrah is the other key wine from Bilancia. In 1998, Leheny and Gibson planted the first syrah vines on the top slopes of their stunning terraced vineyard, la collina (Italian for “the hill”), on the northern flanks of Roys Hill, overlooking the Gimblett Gravels. Since 2002, the site has yielded a majestic red wine of exceptional fragrance and flavour density.
With a beautifully floral, spicy bouquet, highly concentrated flavours of blackcurrants, plums and black pepper, and firm, ripe tannins, Bilancia la collina Syrah 2006 ($90) is benchmark stuff. Already drinking well, it should flourish for a decade.
More affordable, yet also very classy, Bilancia Syrah/Viognier 2007 ($35) was made from grapes grown on la collina and down in the Gimblett Gravels. Finely scented and dark, with red berry, spice and dark chocolate flavours, it has excellent stuffing, ripeness and complexity.
In the deep south, winemaker Christopher Keys joined Gibbston Valley in 2006 after the departure of Grant Taylor, who had made the wines since 1993. Graduating from Otago University in English and Russian, Keys once flirted with the idea of becoming a wine writer, studied winemaking at Lincoln University, then plunged into the industry at the Brookfields winery in Hawke’s Bay, where he “learned about the things that can go wrong and the importance of not screwing up”.
With the launch of three “Expressionist Series” wines from Gibbston Valley, Keys has set out to “rummage in the fringes, where difference occurs and is celebrated. Where the wines become expressionist is in their resistance to mass-market homogenisation, centralisation and rationalisation of style.”
The Le Fou Riesling 2007 ($35) offers lovely lightness (10% alcohol) and intensity of fresh, lemony, appley, gently sweet and minerally flavours. Also grown at Bendigo, in the Cromwell Basin, La Dulcinee Pinot Gris 2007 ($45) is richly scented and strapping (14.5% alcohol), with rich, peachy, citrusy, almost honeyed flavours, slightly sweet and rounded.
The most individual wine is Le Maitre Pinot Noir 2007 ($75). Based on vines more than 20 years old at Gibbston, it is a savoury, complex young wine with firm, concentrated plum/spice flavours. Far from the vibrantly fruity and supple reds that are often seen in the region, this is a serious, tightly structured wine that’s built for the long haul.
