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Spy Valley, Pinot Noir
Wine drinkers (and especially Burgundy drinkers) have come to accept that drinking good Pinot Noir costs a little extra. Call it the Pinot Tariff. Growers call Pinot Noir “the heartbreak grape” because of its delicacy, and the high cost of farming it is usually reflected in the prices of bottles on the shelf.
We taste a lot of wine around here, and I can say this unequivocally: Pinot Noir of the quality of today’s wine from Spy Valley, at this price, is unheard of—well, not exactly unheard of, since we’re offering it today, but incredibly rare to say the least. Yes, you can find other Pinot Noir at this price point but the chances of it being more than a soft, sweet confection are quite slim. You certainly don’t expect the kind aromatic complexity, backbone, and energy this 2013 delivers. Grown in the Sauvignon Blanc mecca that is New Zealand’s Marlborough region, you underestimate this wine at your own peril—as we tasted it, and the excited chatter started to build around it, I thought of all the television talent shows where that “person you’d least expect” brings the house down and wins the prize. Further, I think this wine is authentically New Zealand as well as authentically Pinot Noir, toeing a stylistic line somewhere between Burgundy and Oregon. Perhaps it’s obvious already, but we’re excited about this one—it’s a delicious near-term drinker I’d pay more for if I had to, but that’s the great thing: I don’t have to. And neither do you!
We taste a lot of wine around here, and I can say this unequivocally: Pinot Noir of the quality of today’s wine from Spy Valley, at this price, is unheard of—well, not exactly unheard of, since we’re offering it today, but incredibly rare to say the least. Yes, you can find other Pinot Noir at this price point but the chances of it being more than a soft, sweet confection are quite slim. You certainly don’t expect the kind aromatic complexity, backbone, and energy this 2013 delivers. Grown in the Sauvignon Blanc mecca that is New Zealand’s Marlborough region, you underestimate this wine at your own peril—as we tasted it, and the excited chatter started to build around it, I thought of all the television talent shows where that “person you’d least expect” brings the house down and wins the prize. Further, I think this wine is authentically New Zealand as well as authentically Pinot Noir, toeing a stylistic line somewhere between Burgundy and Oregon. Perhaps it’s obvious already, but we’re excited about this one—it’s a delicious near-term drinker I’d pay more for if I had to, but that’s the great thing: I don’t have to. And neither do you!
Because our offices and warehouse are smack in the heart of a “New World” wine region (Sonoma Valley), we’re highly selective when it comes to other New World wine regions, lest we anger our neighbors. It also doesn’t help that New Zealand—easily among the top five most beautiful wine places on earth—is so far away. I’ve been lucky enough to visit, and it’s indeed incredible, but I don’t get back there nearly as much as I’d like. Although we’ve offered wines from Marlborough before, this is the first Pinot Noir we’ve featured from the region, which of course is known best for its über-aromatic Sauvignon Blancs. Marlborough is the northernmost wine appellation on New Zealand’s South Island, with soils comprised mostly of alluvial gravel mixed with clay. It is a mountainous landscape, generally regarded as a “cool” climate with wide diurnal (day-night) temperature variations and very low rainfall. Although its glacial soils are quite distinct from, say, the limestones of Burgundy, acid retention is not an issue here: There’s terrific snap, crackle, and pop in Spy Valley’s 2013, and a nice mineral component, too, although the mineral aspect is more subdued in comparison to the typical Burgundy.
Spy Valley is an expansive project boasting “100% Kiwi” ownership: The Johnson family began planting vineyards on the vast estate in 1993, and released their first wines in 2000; since then, Spy Valley’s vineyard holdings have grown to 380 acres, all of them “certified sustainable” by the New Zealand Winegrowers Sustainable Winegrowing program. It’s no small feat to make Pinot Noir this impressive at this scale: This 2013 was whole-cluster pressed after harvest, with only the ‘free-run’ juice used to craft the wine, which was fermented in open-topped stainless steel vats on native yeasts. It aged 12 months in French oak barriques before bottling.
It’s also worth noting that this wine has a few years of bottle age, and it’s fascinating to taste a back-vintage wine bottled under screwcap: You can see some maturity beginning to show in the wine’s color, which is a bright garnet with ever-so-slight hints of pink and orange at the rim. The aromas are clean, bright, and still youthful, with lots of wild red and black berry, cherry kirsch, orange peel, sandalwood, cola, black tea, and a hint of licorice. It is medium-bodied and tangy on the palate, igniting the salivary response and beckoning you to come back for another sip. And another. Before you know it, you’re cracking the seal on a new bottle, and we found it shows best after about 30 minutes in a decanter. The reductive (i.e. oxygen-starved) environment the wine has lived in these past few years renders it a little reticent at first, so give it a chance to breathe and come alive—it most definitely does, and is ready to enjoy now and over the next few years. Serve it on the cooler side, say 60 degrees, in Burgundy stems to tame its acidity and allow its fruit and florals to the fore. It has the finesse and lift for a wide range of foods, from seafood to beef—a crowd-pleaser to say the least, and one with genuine class to boot. Grab a case and enjoy it regularly; you’ll be glad you did!
