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Having recently tasted our way through a sumptuous lineup of John Kavanagh’s wines at an upstairs tasting at Regional Wines - it was with bated breath that we descended over the hills towards Te Kairanga for a visit to the cellar door and winery. The region is famously dry - situated in the rain shadow of the Rimutakas, but on this occasion it was showing us just how volatile and changeable the weather in Martinborough can be, as intermittent sunny spells broke into full blown downpours.  Despite the weather, we were greeted by a beaming John at the cellar door and quickly debriefed on TK’s history and the location of its sizeable vineyard holdings that make it the region's largest producer. From Spring Rock in the north to Rua, Martinborough’s southernmost vineyard, the various sites span a variety of micro-climates guaranteeing a diversity of ripeness and styles, giving John the tools he needs for blending his wines. Super-cool Rua with its gruntier tannins and savoury flavours and the hotter Martinborough Terrace with its juicy fruit and ripe phenolics for example. Then we hit the winery with a quick detour via some Pinot vines on the Home Block, where small berry clusters were just taking shape and a cover crop of helpful weeds and flowers was helping to push the vigour of the vines. Once inside we were met with an impressive array of temperature controlled stainless steel fermenters, the fruits of which were now in barrel developing and growing into the wines they are destined to be - and some of which we would later get to sample from the barrel. But first, a quick taste of some experimental barrel work where John was playing with the themes of lees, barrel fermentation and skin contact -  resulting in a textural Sauvignon Blanc, a soft and generous Pinot Gris and a phenolic and acid driven Riesling. Then we were lead, most willingly, to the Chardonnay barrels and given a sneak peak of the wine from different blocks, including some Mendoza destined for the 2019 John Martin. Barrel fermented in March, this wine was very young, but was exceedingly approachable and with concentration to spare. There was a little smile on John’s face as he spoke on the topic of 2019, and you can tell this will be a vintage to watch.  Next stop Pinot Noir, and once again the fruits of three of four blocks, grouped by clone, were siphoned from the barrel and presented for tasting. It’s staggering how different Pinot from different blocks so closely located can be, and shows just how many balls a winemaker must have in the air at any one time. John knows which blocks and plots will hopefully go into his final wines, but there’s no master recipe to follow - it’s just not that simple. At the end of the day, he’ll be juggling each barrel, seeing what has eventuated and blending based on what he tastes. The Pinot samples finished with a barrel composed of the Abel clone. This was the most approachable, with exquisite ripe red fruits and soft tannins typical of Pinot, and which, unsurprisingly, would be destined for the TK flagship John Martin Pinot.  Tasting from the barrel is without doubt the best way to work up an appetite, but before lunch was served, there was time for a liquid degustation of the current release TK wines.  First course was Riesling courtesy of the 2016 and 2018 Estate followed by the 2018 Skin Contact. The ‘16 was a knock-out showing some sexy evolution in the bottle; lemon and lime sherbet on the nose and exquisite mouth puckering acid on the palate. The 2019 Pinot Gris shows exactly why this grape is so popular in New Zealand. Ripe apples and pears with some texture from the 20% barrel fermented component, this is a serious wine in the clothes of a quaffer. The 2017 Sauvignon Blanc gave us regional typicity courtesy of a lovely herbal line that danced between tart green fruit flavours - the result of its provenance in the cool, southerly Rua vineyard. Then it was a lesson in oak with the 2017 Estate and 2018 John Martin Chardonnay. The latter receives 5% or so more new oak, but this is absorbed by the fruit and the structure of the wine meaning that the oak component in the Estate is actually more noticeable. Lastly a triumvirate of 2017 Pinots gave us a fantastic progression though style; the gentle and savoury Estate Pinot sourced mainly from the Rua vineyard; the gruntier, darker Runholder - a blend of 8 clones from 20 year old vines off the Martinborough Terrace and finally the John Martin - a powerful and feminine wine that shines with Goddess-like qualities. Palates primed, it was time for Lunch but served with 2014 and 2015 John Martin Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, in what can only be described as a very pleasant surprise. The food was great but the wines were better! 2014 and 2015 were very different vintages - ‘14 warm and generally good, 2015 starting poorly but finishing well and which resulted in low yields - and, as you’d expect, the wines were very different. Interestingly, the two varieties behaved in opposite ways. The 2014 JM Chardonnay had a mineral steely quality whilst the ‘15 was rounder and more generous, whereas the 2014 Pinot was bigger and broader with bolder tannins and darker fruit compared to the linear, lifted elegance of the 2015.  That’s the beauty of wine at the end of the day - the intrigue that works on so many levels and which means it’s never simply a question of variety or vintage. There’s the site, the soil, the vines, and how they’re tended to. There’s the grapes, how and when they’re harvested and whether they’re destemmed or not. There's the decision to inoculate of go with indigenous yeasts, the size of barrels, types of oak, levels of toast and time in new oak. There’s the type of press, time on skins, lees stirring, cap control and so on... and so on. John (and the team at TK) manage this seemingly chaotic list of decisions with effortless ease - distilling its essence into the bottle where it once again unfolds in layers of complexity and flavour - showing that the human component of wine making is just as important as any of the natural factors.  Here’s to TK - we await the 2019s with much anticipation.   The following Te Kairanga  wines can be purchased from Regional Wines... Te Kairanga Estate Riesling 2015 $17.99 Te Kairanga John Martin Chardonnay 2018 - $42.99 Te Kairanga Runholder Pinot Noir 2017 - $37.99 Te Kairanga John Martin Pinot Noir 2017 - $49.99 Te Kairanga John Martin Pinot Noir 2016 - $49.99

The Highland Park Vertical It was a tasting that took us to the very heart of the Orkneys. Here the Scottish highlands cascade into the sea to rise again as a small archipelago where the relentless battering of the North Sea spray has prevented trees from ever establishing. It’s Scotland alright, but the Norse culture tells a slightly different tale to Scotland’s usual and somehow these factors are reflected in the whisky - or so it is said. The treeless peat is certainly different from your typical common or garden peat, formed mainly from scrub and heather which gives the whiskies a gentle fragrance that combines with the slow ferment driven malt to create a lift which is underpinned by citrus. The wood regime at HP is also strict - no ex bourbon since 2004 only ex sherry from European and American air dried casks, creating a consistency of house style that begs to be tested in a vertical tasting. And of course this is what we did… The lineup… Highland Park Einar Single Malt 40% Signatory Unnamed Orkney 2005 Ucf 10 Yo 46% Highland Park Voyage of the Raven 41.3% Highland Park 16yo Wings of the Eagle 44.5%  Highland Park 12yo 40% Mystery whisky - Ardbeg 19yo Traig Bhan 46.2% Highland Park Dark Origins 46.8% As we worked through the lineup - the house style quickly became apparent. The nosing across seven blind whiskies was impressive, with depth and complexity and a sense of class - notes of dusty fruit, heather and citrus popping up frequently. The whiskies smelt clean, well made, restrained - and spoke of the quality new make for which HP is famous. The opening pair were Einar and Signatory’s Unnamed Orkney - which is believed to be from HP (as opposed to Scapa) and on the night, seemed to fit right into the lineup. These two set us on a fruity footing with lashings of green apples that were balanced by vanilla and cut grass and, surprisingly, had most of us thinking bourbon. The fragrant peat was there too - underpinning the malt cleverly and offering effortless complexity and balance. Then, the voyage of the Raven took us on a journey through plumes of smoke before we landed in fields of figs and rye and took off our leather riding gloves. Again, the package felt very complete, delivered with an ethereal elan - a style that many blends aspire to but seldom meet.  The gloves were quickly back on as The Wings of the Eagle delivered us our first glimpse at real aged elegance. This whisky was a cracker, with dusty spices and vanilla giving us a glimpse of quality oak but unencumbered by any sense of heavy sherry or bourbon. This was all about the clean malt once again and deft touches of aged receded peat - something we would be hoping for later from the night’s mystery whisky, but which failed to materialise.  But before we hit the mystery, there was time for a brief interlude with one of the all time classic whiskies, courtesy of the Highland Park 12 year old. Dubbed the best all round whisky by some critics, it was somewhat overshadowed on the night - especially sitting next to the 16 year old - however its soft and ever so gentle feel had many picking it as a high age statement whisky, proof that it punched above its weight in many ways. This may not be the world’s best whisky, but is a great introduction to single malt whisky. Its clean malt and hints of peat show a multitude of regional styles, all seemingly wrapped up in one clever whisky. And this brings us to our mystery which finally revealed itself as the latest addition to the Ardbeg core range - Traig Bhan 19 year old. This whisky stood out like a sore thumb - a sore thumb to which iodine has been applied before being wrapped in a plaster. Its 19 years of age had done little to soften the meaty Islay peat, and had taken the whisky in a new direction - one of savoury olives, tapenade and taramasalata. It divided the room (there’s always one) and scored poorly on the first night, to then redeem itself on the second, ultimately finishing third. Love it or hate it - it got chins wagging and its slot on the board was quickly full of outlandish descriptors. Say what you will about peat, it certainly gives something to latch onto - a bit like decent sherry for that matter? And which offers a clever segue to the final whisky - the grande finale in this case. Dark origins lived up to its name - the darkest of the whiskies in the glass, it immediately spoke of sherry casks following on with aromas and flavours of marmalade and meat broth, chocolate and treacle. Once again, the clever lick of peat lifted it, removing any sense of heavy-handed cloying sweetness and making it really rather smart. There’s something about peat and sherry when done properly and minimally. One thinks of Hazelburn 13yo (now 14) from Springbank’s unpeated division, but which oozes peat once you’ve spotted it, and many an un-peated Bunnahabhain where just a suggestion of peat and a glimmer of the coast through the clouds from the sea still remains.  That’s the thing about whisky, once you’ve tasted a few - it’s the hidden subtleties, those that need to be coaxed out which really make a whisky sing. Big peat, big sherry - both great in time and place - but if you really want to sit down and drink a whisky - subtlety, sophistication and mystery will often win the day, and these Highland Park whiskies certainly had this. The scores… Highland Park Dark Origins 46.8% - 1st - 8.79 Highland Park 16yo Wings of the Eagle 44.5% - 2nd - 7.97 Mystery whiksy - Ardbeg 19yo Traig Bhan 46.2% - 3rd - 7.66  Highland Park Einar Single Malt 40% - 4th - 7.44 Highland Park Voyage of the Raven 41.3% - 5th - 7.29 Highland Park 12yo 40% - 6th - 7.23 Signatory Unnamed Orkney 2005 Ucf 10 Yo 46% - 7th - 6.85  

Whitehaven Winery founder and managing director Sue White has taken over as the new sponsor of Marlborough's annual wine cycling event, GrapeRide, which will take place on Saturday 28 March 2020. The event has three different courses for varying fitness levels, each one winding its way around Marlborough's vast vineyards for all or part of the course. The first Graperide was held in 2005 when 698 people set off on a course around Marlborough, organised by Pete Halligan (aka the Grape Gonzo). This year the event opened to mountain bikers for the first time which will continue going forward.  “Being a family owned and operated business means that creating positive impacts on our community is vitally important to us” says Whitehaven Wines co-founder and managing director Sue White, who marked 25 years of winemaking this year. Founding sponsors Brigid and John Forrest say they are happy to pass the baton to another wine brand that is equally focused on community and sustainability and which  happens to be a close neighbour. The event will also relocate the start and finish location to The Vines Village on Rapaura Road.   GrapeRide... There are three different courses in GrapeRide: * Short and Long Course MTB  * Classic GrapeRide and 202 km Magnum * The Taster 42 kms * Find out more and register for the event online here: www.graperide.co.nz/

Come and taste two great Gamays – one from the smallest cru in Beaujolais, the other from Central Otago where winemaker Duncan Forsyth from Mt Edward is pioneering this grape. (Nick Mills at Rippon Vineyard is doing likewise and quality is high while quantities remain small and sell mainly at the winery.) The brand new 2019 Mt Edward Central Otago Gamay is fresh out now and was made from hand picked grapes, all destemmed, with no carbonic maceration used in the production (this is a classic winemaking technique of the Beaujolais region, hence for the Gamay grape, because it lifts fruity aromas and flavours).  Instead, Duncan of Mt Ed', opted to accentuate the wine's freshness - its acidity - to provide the lift to make Gamay shine. And shine it does, in the new 2019 Mount Edward Gamay, which had minimal sulphur at bottling after being fermented in 40% old oak and 60% stainless steel tanks. All of the fruit in the new Mt Edward Gamay was grown on the Muirkirk VIneyard on Felton Road in Bannockburn, where there is currently one hectare of Gamay planted and producing - making 400 odd cases. Another hectare of Gamay has now been planted slightly further north near Pisa, Central Otago. Meanwhile, the 2017 Thivin Cotes de Brouilly (click here to buy) comes from Mont Brouilly, an isolated hill in the heart of the Beaujolais region where Romans planted vines and where wine has been made for literally thousands of years. Blue stone, granite and clay limestone are the story of Beaujolais' soils and they soak up the sun's rays, reflecting them back onto the vines to aid ripening.  Chateau Thivin is run by 5th and 6th generation winegrowers, whose ancestors bought the castle and two hectares of vineyards around it on 8 June 1877. The history of this beautiful chateau stretches back even further than that - but the proof of the pudding is in the bottle. And the 2017 Thivin Cotes de Brouilly is one of our best Beaujolais.  Come in for a taste and to buy Beaujolais and Gamay on Thursday 21 November from 1pm onwards in store. All welcome.

Last September saw 8 stunning mystery whiskies tasted blind at Regional Wines. They were an eclectic set - generally big and broody, a mixture of peat and unpeated, old and young and they kept people guessing to the very end.  In the spirit of mystery spirit - here’s my cryptic write up of the whiskies - see if you can match the tasting notes to the whiskies! Answers on a postcard - or email to john@regionalwines.co.nz The lineup… 1) Glen Garioch 17yo Renaissance 3rd Chapter 50.8% 2) Signatory Clynelish 1995 22yo 56.3%3) Dalmore King Alexander III 46%4) Old Particular Craigellachie The Elements 2006 12yo 54.3%5) Benromach 2010 Peat Smoke Sherry Cask Matured 59.9%6) Ballechin Straight From The Cask Ex Sherry 2007 / 2018 #18 61% (available in store)7) Benromach 2008 Batch #1 Cask Strength 57.9%8) Glenfarclas 105 1`L 60% - with PX added. a) We find ourselves in the dusty workshop of a tormented artist. The floor is strewn with off-cuts of oak, pine and balsa from an installation he has just finished after many years, and which he has freshly oiled with linseed to make it glisten. An unfinished marble sculpture stands in one corner and a canvas and easel in another. A bowl of waxy apples, melons and potatoes is the only sign of life and is the inspiration for a still life oil painting that is slowly taking shape. Our artist applies chalk to his hands and pick up a stone cutter, dowses the marble in water and attacks it with the blade - hewing off a lump of wet stone. Taking a step back, he wonders if he’s taken off too much, the sculpture looking slightly uneven... but there’s no going back at this stage…b) Lord Aldmore enjoys nothing more than a blind tea tasting - but cup number seven of the lineup has got him totally stumped. He checks his notes to see what he’s tasted thus far - Jasmine, English Breakfast, Indian Chai and Rooibos, and spits out the tea in his mouth (finding that he tastes so much better when he doesn’t actually swallow). He beckons to his valet for a refill of tricky number seven and as the servant tops him up, the smell of his leather gloves and freshly dubbined shoes is a momentary distraction, but he quickly refocusses. Diving back into the tea he catches a hint of tinned fruit and laughs to himself at how obvious it now suddenly is. He relaxes back into his armchair and writes down Twining’s mango and strawberry fruit tea - ha! It will take more than that to catch out this professional… c) It’s the Pepsi challenge and 8 colas of different descriptions, price points and quality have been lined up for you to taste. As you work your way through them, marvelling at the striking difference between essentially 8 of the same drink you find that one stands out as your favourite. Its big and sweet and there’s something about it you just can't quite put your finger on. You mark down your answers and as the drinks are revealed you are hit by the revelation that your favourite was actually Doctor Pepper. Gosh - how on earth did you fail to spot it! d) Meet Ben, he lives at home by himself. He likes to start the day with a hearty breakfast. Weetabix with lashings of soft brown sugar, Marmite and cheese on toast followed by maple smoked bacon that he fries with a pinch of paprika (he's got an odd palate) and which he washes down with a cup of strong tannic tea. Then it's a quick rolly with only the finest fresh tobacco (lit from a match) before he dresses for work and leaves the house. On this particular day that we get to meet Ben, as he leaves for work, he is greeted by workmen who are out re-tarmacing the road. He stops and inhales a big lung full of coal tar fumes and then spots his appalling neighbour who is also leaving for work, and who, rather annoyingly, is also called Ben. He pretends not to see him but neighbour Ben spots him and runs over for a chat … e) Ben really doesn't like neighbour Ben, he thinks he's cheap and nasty to put it bluntly and lowers the standing of the neighborhood. He wears cotton and synthetic blend suits, smokes cheap cigarettes and smells of burnt toast. As neighbour Ben runs over, Ben spots a carnation in his buttonhole which is next to what looks like a custard stain - how typical. What really annoys Ben about neighbour Ben is that, for all his failings, everyone seems to love him. Somehow his crude charms make everyone smile and, what's more, he's super successful with the ladies… Ben knows he's got more pedigree, but pedigree counts for nothing these days. f) It's Christmas day, lunch has been dispatched and after a few hours In front  of the tele, thoughts are turning to the next meal. Aunt Edna's turkey wrapped in smoked bacon with butter stuffed under the skin was exceptional, but as Phyllis starts cutting her ham, she knows she can steal her thunder. As usual, she's spent over three weeks lovingly basting it, rubbing it with salt and adorning it with cloves, however, this year she's gone the extra yards by injecting it with sherry and adding a final caramel glaze. As she watches it glisten in the light she's confident she going to give Edna's turkey a good stuffing this year… g)Farmer Craig watched the stubble in his barley field burn. It was time to try a new crop, wheat, or corn perhaps, he wasn't sure, but he would need to decide soon as the departing geese he’d seen this morning were a sure sign of the onset of winter and Spring would soon be upon him. The smell was amazing and as the fire roared close to the orchard with its orange, apricot and apple trees, the sweet odour of citrus fused with various essential oils in a heady medley. The next day it would be a slog clearing away the burnt scrub, but for now, he would enjoy the pleasant attack on his senses as it the fire roared into the setting sun. h) As The Great Glendini walked the tightrope, his balance was impeccable and the crowd oohed and ahhed with genuine enthusiasm. Only moments before, he had juggled with a variety of different sized fruit, from lemons, stone fruit and apples, to giant melons only moments after having placed his assistant in an oak box and sawing her in half. Despite his greatness - the feats of daring, sleight of hand and genuine skill - it was fair to say it was a slightly odd routine, and somehow the sum of its whole was never quite the sum of its parts... 

Portuguese wine is on trend and we're shining the spotlight on it this month at Regional Wines & Spirits. Pop into Regional Wines on Saturday 2 November any time between 1pm and 5pm to see what classic and modern Portuguese wines are all about. If you miss the Saturday Portuguese wine tasting, pop in store any time this month (November) to buy great wines from Portugal at discounted prices during our November Taste of Portugal promotion... Portugal encapsulates everything that's both good and challenging about isolation. Its indigenous grape varieties have remained a relative secret for wine drinkers, until relatively recently, due to its position on the west of Spain. It's a country with a fascinatingly wide range of climates from one of the world’s wettest wine regions (Vinho Verde) to one of its driest (the Douro Valley) provide a wide range of climates to suit the vastly different grape varieties and, since co-operative wineries have traditionally defined production in this most western European country, value for money can be outrageously good. So why has it seemingly taken so long for Portugal to rise to prominence as a great wine producing country? It’s a good question and one I turned to The Oxford Companion to Wine for some answers.  Isolation is one reason that Portugal’s grapes have mostly remained firmly at home. And there are plenty of them – the book Wine Grapes lists 77 grapes as indigenous to Portugal but a Portuguese study listed 248 indigenous grapes, in 2013 by the Associacao Portuguesa para a Diversidade da Videira (PORVID). Another factor that has eclipsed Portugal’s wine is its biggest offering to the international wine industry – cork. Portugal is by far the biggest producer of cork in the world. This is made up not only of cork grown in Portugal but also production of cork there from other countries, of which Algeria has been incredibly significant historically. Portugal has 234,000 hectares planted in vines. A big decline from 385,000  hectares in the 1980s. This makes it about a third of the size of France and Italy in vineyards planted and about six times the size of New Zealand’s relatively modest 37,000 hectares of vines – despite not being a large country. Portugal is 600 km long and 200km wide. It has a temperate maritime climate with warm summers and cool wet winters. Average annual rainfall varies widely from north to south and coastal to inland. The Portuguese consume more wine than the Italians and rival the French in terms of the amount of wine consumption. They are better known for their famous fortified wines – port and Madeira - than for their still wines. * We have a growing number of great Portuguese wines in store at Regional Wines.   Top drops include... (click on each to purchase)  2016 Bons Ventos $22.99 A blend of Touriga Nacional, Castelão, Camarate and Tinta Miúda. Fermentation took place in 26.500 litres vats, with programmable pumping over system and temperature control to 28. º C - 30. º C. Maceration and (submerged) cap for 28 days. Three to four months ageing in oak barrels.   2016 Colossal $29.99 A blend of Syrah, Touriga Nacional, Alicante Bouschet and Tinta Roriz (the Portuguese name for Tempranillo – one of the classic top five red grapes used in port production). Grapes were grown in the Lisboa region. They were destemmed, and given pre-ferment maceration at low temperatures for 24 hours. The fermentation occurred in 10,000 litre vats with temperature control, not exceeding 28ºC. After the fermentation the wine had prolonged maceration (cuvaison) for 15 days. It was aged for eight months in French and American oak barrels. 2017 Valcatrina $27.99 This wine comes from Alentejano in the south of Portugal – far hotter and drier than the north and home to most of the country’s cork forests. It’s a blend of Alicante Bouschet, Touriga Nacional and Syrah. Destemed grapes were macerated for 24 hours at low temperatures then fermented in stainless steel vats with temperature control to 27º. C for 14 days followed by four months ageing in French and American oak barriques. 

We’re all looking for the next big thing and if the results of this country's annual wine competition in our biggest wine region are anything to go by, Albarino could well be it for New Zealand winemakers. The white Albarino grape originally comes from Spain’s maritime north west and the north of Portugal, where it's known locally as Alvarinho. It’s shaping up to be an ideal fit for this country’s maritime climate, as gold medal winning wines showed at the Marlborough Wine Show this year. Fresh back from judging at the show earlier this month, I was impressed - as were other judges - by the quality of the three gold medal winning Albarinos from Forrest Estate, Nautilus and Wairau River. These three wines towered over the other alternative variety white wines that we tasted at the show. Fresh, flavoursome and consistent in character and personality, they shine the spotlight on a grape variety that is relatively new but makes a lot of sense for our cool maritime climate. There are still only a handful of Albariños made in Marlborough, so it’s to the credit of the winemakers at these three wineries that their wines all received gold medals this year. John Forrest’s daughter and winemaker, Beth Forrest, worked in Spain where she got to know the grape well. This prompted its arrival into this country. A story not well known but worthy of more exposure, both in print and in our glasses. Here at Regional Wines, we stock two of these award winners, so come on down to try and buy these great whites. Gold medal winning Albarinos  * Click on the first two to buy them from Regional 2019 Nautilus Albariño 2018 Forrest Estate Albarino 2019 Wairau River Albariño Find out more about the Marlborough Wine Show here.    Albarino is... A thick skinned white grape from Galicia in north west Spain, a region with high rainfall, which resembles some aspects of New Zealand's grape growing climate. Albarino is a grape that's high in glycerol, which produces wines high in alcohol and acidity. The best Albariño come from the Rias Baixas DOC of Galicia. It is also made in California wine regions including the Santa Ynez Valley AVA (American Viticultural Association) and the Los Carneros AVA.

The tide is turning in favour of vegans. We are increasingly asked for vegan friendly wines, which is no mean feat because a vast number of wines do qualify but don't state that they are vegan friendly - because that's not usually the impetus for their makers to make their wines unfined. Fining is a process where protein particles are added to wine to bind with invisible floating particles in wine prior to bottling. If wines are not fined, they can end up with a cloudy appearance - which is not everyone's cup of tea. The trouble is that fining is done with protein rich products, such as egg white but also sometimes bentonite; a type of clay. Fining is also believed by some winemakers to remove desired flavours from wine, so it's increasingly popular not to fine wine. Still, all of the above notwithstanding, the demand for vegan wines is on the rise. Big time. It's in tandem with the demand for vegan food. The Guardian reported last month that the UK had an increase in vegan food sales of 388% between 2016 and 2018. The rise was for vegan takeaways in the United Kingdom. Not bad for a country best known for its greasy fish 'n chips and creamy chicken tikka marsalas rather than vegetable based take outs. The report, published in The Guardian Weekly in September this year, estimated that there are now 600,000 people in the UK who are vegan. Mainstream supermarkets and caterers are increasingly targeting this market with their food. As are wine, beer and spirits merchants. Which is where we come in. The massive rise in demand for vegan drinks helps explain why we have a growing number of customers asking for vegan wines. One of our newest initiatives at Regional Wines & Spirits this year has been to clearly label our organically certified wines on our shelves in store. We have done this with clear green cards stating 'Certified organic'. And unless a wine is certified for organic wine production, it doesn't qualify for our green card. The same goes for biodynamically certified wines, which we have labelled on our shelves with blue cards.  Next up, vegan friendly wines.  It's a tricky area because many wines are vegan friendly but don't state it on the label, so it will be a work in progress but it's one that we want to be better informed about when it comes to specific wines in store. Watch this space.

Beaujolais conjures up mixed reactions from wine lovers who tend to love or loathe its fruity charms, especially when the word nouveau comes up... writes Joelle Thomson.   The grape that makes Beaujolais is called Gamay and it's an onamatoepaic word. This means that Gamay sounds soft and rich, and Gamay makes soft, rich and fruity tasting wines.  Gamay is an old Burgundian grape variety and was first written about in 1395.  It is also known as Gamay Noir, Gamay Beaujolais and Gamay Blanc (a mutation of the black skinned grape that can appear on the same vines as its darker sibling), among many other names.  France is home to more Gamay than... ... you can shake a stick it because France has the biggest number of plantings of Gamay in the world. The latest figures (2009) indicate that Gamay is the seventh most planted grape in France with 30,443 hectares (75,226 acres).  It is allowed to be grown in almost every wine growing region in France, apart from Bordeaux, the island of Corsica (Corse) and Alsace. That said, about two thirds of Gamay plantings are in the greater Vallée de Rhone, which includes the Beaujolais region. Wine writer Jancis Robinson says most Gamay was light and fruity in the past. "Those rushed through the cellar by vinification techniques such as carbonic maceration in order to reach the market in November after the harvest as Beaujolais Nouveau were often thin and tasted like bananas and bubble-gum. However, with the decline in fashion and market demand for this style and the increasing number of well-made and ambitious wines vinified more traditionally, sometimes with oak aging, Gamay is showing more purely its fine, refreshing, sometimes peppery, red fruit - and surprising longevity in the case of some wines, from the ten crus of Beaujolais," she writes in her hefty 3.8 kilogram tome called Wine Grapes. How it grows... Gamay is a grape that's prone to spring frosts, but which also enjoys a not-too-hot climate in which to ripen, which is one reason winemaker Duncan Forsyth now makes Gamay in Central Otago. And a beautiful dark and fruity drop it is, too, which is why we'll crack a bottle open at our Next level Beaujolais tasting on Thursday 21 November this year, in store.   Taste next level Beaujolais (and Gamay)  There's more to life in Beaujolais country than the much besmirched 'nouveau' and this year we celebrate Beaujolais Day at Regional by showing the Gamay grape (the sole ingredient in Beaujolais) in a whole new light – for a start, we are not cracking open any bottles of nouveau. Pop into Regional for our weekly Thirsty Thursday tasting on Beaujolais Day to taste what Gamay is really all about; ripe fruit flavours held together in a structured, full bodied red, thanks to a great grape and good winemaking. Beaujolais - the next level tasting is on Thursday 21 November in store from 1pm to 5pm. The wines we will taste are... 2017 Chateau Thivin Sept Vignes Cotes de Brouilly Beaujolais Special $39.99 (RRP $42.99) 2019 Mount Edward Gamay Central Otago Special $29.99 (RRP $32.99)

John Sherlock reports back from the sherry cask aged whiskies tasting at Regional Wines The lineup... (click to purchase) Kurayoshi Japanese Sherry Cask Pure Malt Whisky 43% Old Particular Glenburgie 1997 21yo 51.5% (sherry butt) Signatory Glenlivet 2007 UCF 11 Yo 46% (1st fill sherry butt) Bladnoch Adela 15yo 46.7% (oloroso cask) Mystery Whisky - Glendronach 15yo Revival 46% Adelphi Bunnahabhain 2009 10yo #900021 58.8% (1st fill sherry European oak) Kavalan Solist Oloroso Sherry Cask 57.1%  This was a tasting that was supposed to be all about the sherry - but in the end it became as much an exercise on the effects of oak and age and a lesson in the ambiguities of “labeling” in the strangely opaque industry that is whisky. The tasting kicked off with the Kurayoshi Sherry Cask Pure Malt, a light and simple whisky but not without its merits. It’s a hybrid of Scotch and Japanese malt, so to call it a pure malt seems slightly disingenuous, and of course, none of this is revealed anywhere on the label. Next was the 21yo Glenburgie which the label states is charged form a sherry butt. This promise of style and content will be a dangling carrot to many - but really it's a glaring omission of detail. It doesn't tell us what sherry was in that butt, how many times it’s been refilled and most importantly what oak was used to make the butt, after all, the previous contents of an inactive or multiple-refill cask are of diminishing importance - and the provenance of the actual oak becomes the key factor. Upon tasting the whisky, dying hints of stewed and dried fruits are a glimpse of sherry, but a 21 year conversation between malt and oak has seen a shift in topic from sweet to savoury, and could be evidence of a tired cask or a few refills perhaps. On further inspection, hints of green apples, pine and cut grass lead us more towards a bourbon cask, so perhaps we’re actually tasting American oak, an ex bodega American oak cask perhaps used over decades in a solera, primarily for oxidative ageing purposes, and inert in many respects. This was certainly a thinking whisky and, of course, part of the charm of whisky is to sip and dissect, but wouldn't it be great if all these facts were made readily available on the label? You may have bought this whisky with the lure of the sherry butt - but would you have bought it if the knew it was an old inert cask made from American oak? The Glenlivet tells us a bit more on the label, well, the number of fills at any rate - but of course the provenance of oak is amiss? This seemed like American oak too, offering us sweet tropical fruits and a scarcity of tannin. A fun whisky with layers of confection, tropical fruits and shiny brass tack malt, and at a great price, but if you were looking for sherry then you’d arguably be better off buying something like the Glenrothes 12yo - and in this respect, you have to wonder if some tasting notes on the packaging wouldn’t actually be a bad thing. Cadenhead put notes on their small batch releases, and as much as they can be slightly odd, they at least provide a starting point when searching for a hint of guidance on what you’re actually purchasing. The Bladnoch Adela gives us another permutation of ambiguity. It’s marked “oloroso cask” which at least gives us the specific sherry that filled the cask, but now we’re in the dark on size of casks used (this being a blend of casks), and once again the type of oak. Also, does the specific mention of oloroso mean that generic sherry casks are not typically oloroso (i.e. they could be cream sherries, px, fino, manzanilla or amontillado) or is it possible that some distilleries literally don’t know what sherry was in the cask? This seems unlikely. More likely is that the generic term sherry serves as a convenient absence of detail, a bit of misdirection if you like, that woos us into thinking we’re buying a better product. The Adela was much more what we’d been looking for. A complex compendium of key oloroso descriptors; stewed and dried fruits, xmas cake, walnuts, caramel, sandalwood and more.  The distillery was mothballed in 2009/10 and reopened in 2017 when the Adela was released from pre-existing stock, so it's likely there's some quite old whisky in there too. A quick peruse of their website shows that this is actually charged from both Spanish and American oak but none of this can be found on the label. The Spanish oak gives this whisky some real depth and is something to shout about, so why not have it on the label? Things were on the up, and getting better with each whisky. Next was the mystery whisky which would eventually be revealed as the ever elusive Glendronach 15yo Revival. This was doing something slightly different to the others with some PX cask aging, and If there’s one distillery that knows how to coax the best out of a PX cask, it’s Glendronach. This had layers of dried fruits, prunes and raisins, complexed by savoury leathers and freshly varnished wood, buffed to glisten with a rag and some Pledge. Following the revival (in every sense) was our third single cask, this one a 10yo Bunnahabhain bottled independently by one of our faves - Adelphi. As much as we love Adelphi, they are equally as guilty of poor communication concerning what's in the bottle. However, this is something they are starting to address through employing a block chain system to record the whisky's history. An example can be found on the Ardnamurchan distilled at their very own Ardnamurchan distillery - and here's hoping this becomes common place in the whisky world and that one day we will be able to unlock the secrets of our whiskies with a simple app and the click of a button. But for now it's a case of online research, and a quick perusal reveals this to be most probably 1st fill sherry European oak. It's a gorgeous drop that somehow manages to be coastal, earthy, meaty and fruity in one hit. There's evident tannin from the European oak which, combined with the 58.8% abv, gives the whisky some real weight. The tasting finished with the Kavalan Solist Sherry Cask - a sticky date pudding dessert course to complete the feast of whiskies. It was our fourth single cask of the evening, something that wasn't particularly well advertised on the packaging, and again we were left in the dark as to what sherry the cask had previously contained. This appealed to many at the tasting, but the sweetness was cloying and with none of the refreshing complexities of the Bunnahabhain. With a "sherry" theme, this certainly wasn't the one track tasting many may have expected. There was real diversity on show with savoury, tropical, light and heavy whiskies all doing their thing. But then these whiskies were obviously aged in a broad variety of casks (despite what the whiskies told us on the labels). There's two ways of looking at this, either as a big positive and proof of the diversity that one style of whisky can offer, or as an epic fail in the attempt of these whiskies to actually deliver what they state they are. I'm sitting on the fence on this one. I'm keen on diversity but, that said, I want to be able to make an informed and accurate decision when I purchase and be confident of what it is that I will end up consuming, and to be fair, that's not often the case with whisky as things currently stand... Here's the scores Kurayoshi Japanese Sherry Cask Pure Malt Whisky 43% - 6.82Old Particular Glenburgie 1997 21yo 51.5% (sherry butt) - 7.41Signatory Glenlivet 2007 UCF 11 Yo 46% (1st fill sherry butt) - 6.93Bladnoch Adela 15yo 46.7% (oloroso cask) - 8.16Mystery Whisky - Glendronach 15yo Revival 46% - 8.41Adelphi Bunnahabhain 2009 10yo #900021 58.8% (1st fill sherry Euro oak) - 9.13Kavalan Solist Oloroso Sherry Cask 57.1% - 8.99

When Steve Skinner started at Elephant Hill back in 2006, his first move was to rip out the struggling Bordeaux varieties at the Te Awanga site and set in motion the acquisition of new vineyards in the Bridge Pa and Gimblett Gravels districts. This was the beginning of a simple plan, but a plan nevertheless to diversify in every which way possible, drawing the best from the complexities of Hawke’s Bay's sub-regions, allowing Steve to make the best wines he can.  You only get one shot per vintage at making wine, but if you strip each vineyard back to its base components of blocks, rows and parcels, fermenting each separately, then essentially you are making hundreds of wines each vintage, learning everything you can about each vineyard and creating a lifetime of wines in only a short period.  In doing so, one gets to know one’s vineyards, what sort of fruit they provide and how they respond in each vintage. This is a fractal approach to winemaking working at increasing levels of complexity. A region divides into subregions, and then into vineyards which give way to rows until eventually you're working with each vine separately, and learning, for example, that those in the dips and troughs perform differently in the warm vintages.  In the same respect, this approach also provides the ultimate way of spreading one's bets to insure against investment. With a string of sites that can be subdivided further and further, a winery’s resilience to climate and vintage variation is greatly increased. In a warm vintage the cooler coastal sites of Te Awanga will deliver the goods, in a wetter vintage, the free draining soils of the Gimblett Gravels will come up trumps, and so on. The wines may change each vintage, but this is a small trade off for the guarantee of quality and also provides a level of variation that true wine lovers crave. We don’t want to drink the same juice year in year out, we want to be kept guessing and kept on our toes. We want to be challenged, and variation provides the perfect incentive for buying new vintages. This was expressed beautifully at the tasting with two verticals of the Arivata and Hieronymus that spanned the consecutive vintages of 2015,’14 and ‘13. The wines were all so different, personalities that Steve had coaxed out of his vineyards by letting them speak and reflect each vintage. The Airavata Syrah marries the masculin fruit from Gimblett Gravels with the feminine florals and fine tannins of coastal Te Awanga fruit. Two sites only 25K apart but with vastly different microclimates. The 2015, blended from 20 different ferments, is a racey electric wine, driven and precise with fruit, acid and tannin in fine balance. The ‘14 is riper, a warmer vintage that Steve countered with a higher proportion of whole bunch to sharpen it up, and then once again round off with 27 months in oak. The results are almost Burgundian with lifted pinot-esque red and black berry fruits and only a smattering of muted black pepper. The '13 on the other hand is aromatic and spicy, round and grippy in the mouth and quintessentially Syrah.  The three Hieronymus were even more individually distinct, the perfect example of a winemaker using all his tools to achieve his very best. The varietal composition is unique each vintage with Steve drawing on the best performing varieties, and although vastly different in flavour profile - they show superb consistency in quality.  The ‘15 is very much a Hawke's Bay twist on the Bordeaux blend with a small percentage of  tempranillo added to the mix. Similarly to the 2015 Airavata, this is a precise wine that has it all - ripe fruit and racy acidity balanced by fine grain tannins. The ‘14 is its antithesis. Big and broody, round and full, this is principally a blend of Malbec and Merlot, but with a small component of Cabernet Sauvignon blended in for its balancing acidity and brightness. Its warm embrace is hard to refuse and the riper fruit makes it the most approachable of the three. The ‘13 was the most Bordeaux-like, with 60% Cabernet from the Gimblett Gravels imbuing the wine with layers of cassis that balanced nicely with the plummy darkness of Merlot and Malbec from Bridge Pa. Steve's master plan has also instigated a gradual premiumisation at Elephant Hill, that saw a deliberate switch to lower yields and a focus on the top end in 2016, and which instantly paid dividends in the following vintage. 2017 was a shocker in the Hawke's Bay, but the move to lower yields meant earlier ripeness and earlier fruit picking and consequently the grapes missed the worst of the weather. You need a bit of luck when making wine and this is a great example of how you can make your own luck. The focus on the premium has also seen the addition of what could be the final piece in the Jigsaw. In 2015 Elephant Hill launched the Series wines - single vineyard wines only released in exceptional vintages. These are the antithesis of the wines blended across multiple sites and provide yet another way for Steve to present his very best. Labelled as Sea, Stone and Earth - they are varietal wines made exclusively with fruit from Te Awanga, Gimblett Gravels and the Bridge PA Triangle respectively. It is sometimes said that winemakers make too many expressions that can confuse the consumer, but this is a clever way of letting people get to know the winery and the region, and priced under the Icon wines, provides another affordable route to the consumer. It’s fair to say that Hawke's Bay has lost ground to other New Zealand wine regions in the last decade or so, with the likes of Central Otago giving it a real run for its money. As a region, it’s a trickier marketing proposition thanks to a slew of grape varieties. Also, the recent surge in Syrah popularity sees it almost competing with itself, in a Bordeaux v Rhône fashion. Tasting Steve's wines you really get a glimpse of just how exciting this region is, how well it delivers across numerous varieties and the variation it can express through its subregions. Steve is powering the region in new directions which can only serve to attract new fans and push the region forward. This isn’t just good for Hawkes Bay - it’s of course good for NZ wine too. Click here to see the Elephant Hill wines that are available at Regional Wines.  

  The word traditional often conjures up ideas of conservative and dull but when it comes to sparkling wine, nothing could be further from the truth. Traditional method bubbles are made the same way as champagne, only without using the 'c' word, which is legally restricted only to those in the Champagne region, who won exclusive legal naming rights to their region's name in 1958. Good on the French for protecting such a powerful brand. So, what is the traditional method? It involves two fermentations, the second one followed by a long, slow aging on lees - the decomposing yeast cells left over following fermentation. These cells release manoproteins as they break down into the wine, making it taste of fresh pastry, bread and sourdough. Delicious, in other words. And the longer the wine spends on lees, the better; more intensity comes about as a result of this slow aging process. It's a costly one too. Join us in store on Saturday 5 October to find out more about why traditional bubbles are simply the best… Pop in for a taste and talk with the makers - accompanied with finger food to match. Join us from 1pm onwards. The bubbles open at Regional's mini fizz festival...  Saturday 5 October 1pm to 5pm Quartz Reef Brut NV Quartz Reef Blancs de Blancs 2013 Quartz Reef Rosé Alan McCorkindale Rosé 2009 Saint Clair Dawn 2013 No 1 Family Estate Assemble NV No 1 Family Estate Calibre 70 Cuvee No 1 Family Estate Blancs de Blancs NV Nautilus Brut NV Nautilus Rosé Palliser Estate Methodé The Griffin Pelorus NV Pelorus Rose NV Pelorus Vintage 2006 from magnum – special edition   The bubbles open at Regional's mini fizz festival...  Saturday 5 October 1pm to 5pm Quartz Reef Brut NV Quartz Reef Blancs de Blancs 2013 Quartz Reef Rosé Alan McCorkindale Rosé 2009 Saint Clair Dawn 2015 No 1 Family Estate Assemble NV No 1 Family Estate Calibre 70 Cuvee No 1 Family Estate Blancs de Blancs NV Nautilus Brut NV Nautilus Rosé Palliser Estate Methodé The Griffin Pelorus NV Pelorus Rose NV Pelorus Vintage 2006 from magnum – special edition

Frankie Mcphail loves whiskey. That said, she’s currently having a rather serious affair with gin.If you've been to the Heyday brewery in Wellington at anytime over the last few months, you may have noticed a rather splendid and shiny apparatus that protrudes into the air like a giant’s saxophone. This is Southward Distilling Co., the love child of Frankie's passion for spirits that she lovingly assembled by hand in the ultimate Ikea project. Dreamt up by Frankie in her home of British Columbia after researching local distilleries, the setup speaks volumes on her take on making gin. The 300L copper pot still complete with whiskey helmet and a large basket for botanicals, all help to create a fuller, deeper distillate. She's also opted for grain spirit as a base which gives increased sweetness compared to whey spirit, and uses a process that gives her Botanicals two chances to converse with the distillate. Once in a wet run through steeping in the pot still, and then as a dry component when the distillate hits the basket. Consequently, her gins are far from simple facsimiles of the London Dry style, and can be sipped like whiskey. For Frankie, making gin is only a small part of the distilling story and opens a doorway to experimentation and opportunity. In this vein, she is bringing an understanding and respect for other drinks’ styles to her process - and the results are impressive. The Mountain and Wave Gin which we stock at Regional Wines form the core range, and epitomise her style with a lovely round mouthfeel and some serious complexity. Then there’s her experimental ‘single batch’ gins which are made in tandem with limited edition seasonal beers at Heyday. I was lucky enough to try a few, and they quickly had me hoping that one day they’d be on the shelves at Regional too.Her Smoked Rosemary Gin is an exquisite deep copper colour and takes the palate on a savoury journey - caramelised winter vegetables garnished with rosemary that evoke memories of roast lamb fresh from a wood-fire oven. On the other hand, the Blueberry Gin is all about fruit sweetness, but is made with a winemaker’s attention to detail and a deftness of touch with delicate levels of extraction and maceration. The palate is all about bright blue fruit flavours that meld harmoniously with gentle tannins in a mulled wine meets sloe gin experience. Her Grapefruit Gin is more classical, offering a spectrum of citrus pith and zest that is bottled at 50% giving it some real oomph. This is Frankie's bridge building gin through which she can craft trust in her products, after all, there’s plenty of us out there who still want a gutsy gin to which we can add some tonic.Her brand building extends further into the Wellington community through her Locals Range. These are gins made in collaboration with restaurants and producers, that to date, has seen Frankie work with Hanging Ditch and Apache, amongst others, crafting house gins they can serve off their lists. This is smart business that maximises her reach whilst allowing for further experimentation.So, exciting times at Southward with a rapidly expanding list of products and real exposure in Wellington’s food and drinks scene. So what's next? Whiskey of course, after all this is where it all began. Frankie is currently experimenting at home on a series of small stills, perfecting the wash before she takes her ambitious whiskey plans to the next stage. She’s even got some exciting Wellington sites in mind for the distillery that will certainly give the spirit a sense of place, and as with the gin, her sights are firmly set on a malt that is distinctly individual, that borrows from Scotch and bourbon without simply replicating them. It was once a toss up between moving to Scotland to pursue her dreams or setting up a distillery in Wellington - luckily for us, Frankie chose the latter. Click to purchase. Southward Distilling Co. Mountain Gin 42% - $67.99 Southward Distilling Co. Wave Gin 47$ - $72.99

What is the world’s greatest white wine? It’s a question with many different answers, depending on who you're talking to. Chardonnay may be the preferred choice of many but Chenin Blanc comes a close second for wine lovers who like the balance that Chenin's naturally high acidity brings to bear on whites in a wider range of styles than most white grapes are capable of. Sparkling, dry, off dry, medium dry and unctuously sweet. Chenin Blanc has the natural attributes to make all these styles and more. It's also known as Pineau or Pineau de la Loire in its traditional homeland, aka the Loire Valley in north central France.  The Loire is the longest river in France and forms the basis of one of the country's most diverse wine regions. Its great white grapes are Chenin Blanc and Sauvignon Blanc, both being made in a wide range of styles, due to the varying climatic zones along the river.  Ironically, the Loire is not the world's most heavily planted region when it comes to Chenin Blanc grapes today. That credit belongs to South Africa, which is home to approximately 18,200 hectares of Chenin, according to the latest statistics available, as of 2012. France, by contrast, has just under 10,000 hectares - almost half the amount. But it's the sheer diversity and ageability of the Chenin Blanc grape that makes it a strong contender to be one of the wine world's faves when it comes to great whites. Master of Wine, author and wine writer Jancis Robinson often writes of Chenin as a great white on the basis of its ability to age, evolve interesting flavours and retain its hallmark of freshness for decades, often even in humble, low priced wines. Our wine of the week is further proof, if any was needed, that Chenin is one of the world's great whites. Come and try it this Wednesday afternoon. Buy Marc Bredif Vouvray here: https://www.regionalwines.co.nz/products/marc-bredif-vouvray-17-special

James and Annie Millton are to organic wine what cocoa is to chocolate. The two are inextricably linked and today the name Millton is a by-word for organic wine certification.  Millton Vineyards began life in 1984 and it didn't take long for the company to become the first producer of certified organic wine in this country; in 1989. "The health of our workers was on the line," recalls Annie Millton, who once told me in an interview about her and James' journey into organic wine production at their now iconic Gisborne winery. Their vineyard workers had rashes that came and went but were particularly pronounced whenever they used the man made sprays that were deemed part of the necessary routine to get grapevines to grow and remain disease free. "I started putting two and two together and we decided to stop using sprays, which meant that we had to find another way to work with our vines," says Annie Millton. It also meant working with the environment instead of fighting against it - "We work for ease rather than dis-ease," is one of James Millton's often repeated refrains. The Milltons became New Zealand's first vineyard and winery to have Bio-Gro certification in 1989 and the rest is history, so to speak. Today the Millton Vineyard is fully certified as biodynamic too with Demeter certification, which was gained in 2009.  “It is the penultimate form of growing things,” says James, who is a member of the Renaissance des Appellations; a French biodynamic group, to which he has belonged since 2004. The English translation of the name means ‘return to the land’, which is exactly the aim - to look after the land rather than merely take what it provides. Young James' and wine  By the time he was 14, James Millton was picking all the fruit he could find from the scrubby blackberry bushes growing in the wild near to where he lived on the South Island's west coast. It picked the fruit so that he could ferment it because he was  fascinated by the process. And yet it was a book, rather than a sip, that set him on the path to making wine. ‘The Boot’s Home Brewing Guide’ was given to him by his father. “My father passed on ‘The Boot’s Home Brewing Guide’ to me and said ‘I think you should read this’. That was the beginning of the end. I believe now that you get one piece of information in your life, which becomes a major lead. That was mine.”     The real beginning of the end – of his childhood at least – was being expelled from high school for fermenting fruit. He then became “a pest” to wineries, writing to every one he could find, asking to be taken on as a trainee. The chief executive of Montana Wines was then Russell Gibbons, who relented and offered Millton a cadetship, after his fourth letter. “By that stage he realised I was quite determined, I think,” says Millton, adding that “by that stage I had written so many times and finally told him that ‘I got booted out of school for making wine - how about it?’ that it worked. I was taken on as a cadet.” The rest is history in the making. Organic wine tastings in store... Join the team at Regional on Saturday 14 September from 1pm in store and on Wednesday 18 September from noon for our two organic wine week tastings.

John Kavanagh obviously had a plan when he took over the reins at Te Kairanga in 2012, and It didn't take him long to find his feet. He's now strapped on the track shoes and is going for gold each vintage, capping a run of consecutive wins at the Decanter World Wine Awards with the ultimate accolade - Best in Show for his 2017 John Martin Pinot Noir. You can take wine awards with a pinch of salt, many do, but at the end of the day, coming out on top in a list of thousands of wines, scrutinised by some of the world's top MWs is no mean feat (only 0.3% of wines entered were awarded Best in Show). What's more remarkable is that this was achieved in a tricky vintage, and this is where John's accomplishments become really telling. Tasting John’s wines at Regional Wines was proof that wine making skill and ability only count for so much in Martinborough and that it is having the prowess and experience to work with the vintage and think on one’s feet that makes the difference. Demonstrating this, the tasting finished with a vertical of the John Martin Pinot Noir 2017,’16 and ‘15 which were strikingly different wines. The ‘17 aromatic and savoury, linear and precise compared to the warm, friendly embrace of the ‘16 with its exquisite typicity, and the ‘15 a gruntier wine with lip-smacking concentration. Three different wines that you'd love to have in the cellar for different occasions, if life were so kind. And of course, these were surprisingly different vintages. 2015 a vintage of two halves that resulted in super low yields, ‘16 a dry and warm benevolent El Niño year and 17 cool and wet. To aim at the same wine for each of these vintages would of course be madness - and yet it takes real winemaking courage to let the fruit sing without hiding it behind an orchestra of new oak and high extraction, and this is what John has done.  The new lease of life at TK is exciting and bodes well for Martinborough in general and the recent accolades will help to put the region back on the world wine map - something it thoroughly deserves. TK’s future certainly looks bright too, with a high percentage of the oh so special Abel Pinot clone, some sexy and diverse sites on the Martinborough Terrace, Longbush Valley and Ruakokoputuna Valley - and with John at the helm.  That said, the wine industry is without a doubt fickle. You’re only ever as good as your last vintage, and to rest on one’s laurels is certainly foolhardy; in many ways Te Kairanga’s recent history prior to John’s arrival is proof of this. 2019 looks set to be a stunner, so it will be fascinating to see what John comes up with, and of course, the expectation for more trophies will be high. But John won’t be fazed by this, he doesn’t seem the sort to get flustered and will have his sights set firmly on the future, after all, he’s been in the game long enough now to know that wine making is a marathon and not a sprint. Click here to purchase Te Kairanga wines from Regional Wines. Te Kairanga Estate Riesling 2015 $17.99 Te Kairanga John Martin Chardonnay 2018 - $42.99 Te Kairanga Runholder Pinot Noir 2017 - $37.99 Te Kairanga John Martin Pinot Noir 2017 - $49.99 Te Kairanga John Martin Pinot Noir 2016 - $49.99

There’s been some great tastings at Regional Wines of late. We’ve visited the warmth of South Australia with Samuel's Gorge and Langmeil, performed a mini wine tour de France with our friends at Maison Vauron (without breaking into a sweat!) and got happily lost in the splendours of the 2016 southern Rhônes. If I were to revisit these tastings in the bottle once more, here’s what I’d pick... and funnily enough, they’re all currently available at Regional Wines.... 2015/17 Samuel’s Gorge Grenache - $49.99 Justin McNamee takes on southern Rhône winemakers at their own game with this juicy Grenache from McLaren Vale that is dangerously quaffable. Made with a deft touch, the fruit has really been allowed to shine with minimal extraction offering gentle tannins and lacy acidity that ease the red fruits through the palate. A versatile wine that will pair well with not just red and white meats but also flavoursome fish dishes. 2017 Terres Georges Coteaux du Languedoc “Racine” - $36.99 Remember the Languedoc - France’s great hope for a modern winemaking revolution at one stage and now somewhat, and rather unfairly, overlooked. This is 100% Carignan which immediately sets it apart in a region dominated mainly by blends of Grenache, Syrah Carignan and Mourvedre. It’s a stunner at a stunning price - dark fruits, slate and mineral elements with fine acidity and sumptuous balance. A thinking wine, but with enough body and charm to woo the taste buds before the brain is engaged taking it to the next level. 2015 Capbern St Estephe - $65.99 I’ll confess, since moving to NZ I don’t drink half as much Bordeaux as I used to - but this really strikes me as Bordeaux as it should be, how it used to be before too much new oak was being liberally plashed around. The oak is certainly present here, but very much in check, and the fruit is pure and driven, with cassis and dark bramble flavours delivered in a silken mouthful thanks to fine ripe tannins and lacy acidity. Stunning stuff - it’s actually drinking now, but leave it in the cellar for another ten years and it will be ten fold better. 2016 Vieux Télégraphe La Crau - $153.99 Châteauneuf-du-pape meets Burgundy in this racy number that lights up the palate like liquid electricity. The nose is all red fruits, spice and herbs, but gives way to a palate of darker fruits; cherries and cassis. Very fine and elegant with immense length. Again, one that will do well in the cellar. 2016 Domaine de Janasse Châteauneuf-du-pape - $86.99 A more classical Châteauneuf when placed alongside the Vieux Télégraphe, with all the opulence one would expect from the warmth of the southern Rhône. The nose and palate both show red and black fruits but lean more heavily towards the latter. This is fresh and lifted yet somehow powerful - silky yet fulsome - in that contradictory fashion that only the best wines seem to offer. 2015 Langmeil, Orphan Bank Shiraz - $62.99 (just sold out at the time of publishing - but more coming) A remarkable wine with an amazing story. The ancient 140 year old pre-phylloxera vines that produce this Shiraz were rescued from the hands of a dastardly property developer and replanted at a site on the bank of the local Para River. To help fund the project, after all this kind of endeavour is not a cheap one, people were offered the chance to adopt the orphan vines and were given first dibs on securing wines released. The water table is high at the site and so vegetation is allowed to grow freely throughout the vineyard - sucking up any excessive water and helping to force the vine roots deeper. Despite this, the vineyard can sometimes be found under water when the banks of the river break in times of flood, and when this happens, the amazingly resilient vines are simply propped back up and allowed to go about their business of growing fantastic fruit. This wine shows scintillating black fruits balanced by handsome tannins and silky acidity. Plush in the mouth, with real concentration, this is complex too with hidden mineral and savoury depths. 

Red wine and chocolate sounds like a match made in heaven but they have traditionally been seen as a bit of a no-no together because the high sugar content in chocolate can overwhelm fruity flavours in red wine. Unless it's port or a fortified red, such as Banyuls from southern France, or unless you break the traditional rules. Which is not only interesting but sometimes essential to discover if those rules held any water in the first place.  Wine of the week with chocolate... 10 September 2017 Finca Baraca Four Elements Time Waits for No One The wine we have chosen as our Wine of the Week for 10 September to 17 September seems like an ideal red to drink with chocolate. It's new in store and we think it over delivers on flavour for the modest price in a big way - it is the 2017 Finca Baraca Four Elements Time Waits for No One GM Monastrell, on special at $23.99 (RRP $25.99). It comes from the hot climate of Jumilla, a wine region in the Levante, north of Murcia, in central southern Spain. The climate there is dry with a miniscule 300mms annual rainfall and the main grape is Monastrell - also known as Mourvédre. It's a dark red grape that ripens well in warm to hot climates like Jumilla and also in Bandol, a small appellation in Provence that's devoted mostly to Mourvédre and also Chateauneuf-du-Pape in the southern Rhone Valley. Monastrell Monastrell is the Spanish name for this deeply coloured red grape, which can ripen to a natural alcoholic strength of 18% in Jumilla's arid summer temperatures of up to 40 degree Centigrade during the day.  The intense colour, flavour and smoothness are the upsides of Monastrell. The downside is that this grape naturally gives pretty low yields. This means each grapevine produces a relatively small number of grapes, so it can be financially tenuous to make a profit from wines made from Monastrell. Grapegrowers and winemakers in Jumilla are combatting historically low yields by planting new vines that are grafted onto rootstocks that will promote higher yields.  Blending Monastrell Approximately 80% of the grapes in Jumilla are Monastrell so most of the wine is a 100% varietal red made solely from this grape.  There are also blends of Monastrell with softer tasting red grapes such as Merlot and Tempranillo, both of which can help tone down the richness of the wine.  As for drinking red wine with chocolate, we all know what they say about rules - they're made to be broken. Or at least bent a little.

John Shearlock reports back from a lineup of tongue twisting whiskies at Regional Wines. Amrut Kadhambam Single Malt 50% - $172.99 Inchmurrin Madeira Finish 46%- $99.99 Craigellachie Old Malt Cask 2006 11yo 50%  - $119.99 Talisker Distillers Edition Amoroso Finish 45.8% - $132.99 Benriach 22yo Dark Rum Dunder 46% - $347.99 - available in store Benriach 22yo PX Albariza 46% - $347.99 - available in store Amrut Portonova Single Malt 62.1% - sold out With the recent changes to the Scotch Whisky Association technical file - it's very possible that this lineup of “crazy casks” will soon look quite pedestrian and that we won't be needing to look as far afield as india for some tongue twisting anomalous whiskies. In case you missed that change - Scotch whisky can now be aged or finished in a much broader variety of oak casks, including those previously used to age agave spirits (Tequila and mezcal), Calvados, barrel-aged cachaça, shochu and baijiu, as well as some other fruit spirits. Judging by the scores from this tasting - this may well scare a few of the purists amongst the Wellington whisky scene. It’s fair to say that this was indeed a challenging tasting. When such a variety of flavour is on show - you often can't see the wood for the trees. With a more classical lineup  - the flavours typically ramp up with a broadening flavour spectrum and greater alcohol, allowing for acclimatisation and for the palate to adapt. This is one explanation why our scores typically increase towards the latter stages of the tasting. However, when the whiskies are all so varied - the palate is left blindsided, and each new whisky demands a recalibration which is often too big an ask. The order of tasting is often made slightly challenging too at Daniel Bruce McLaren’s tastings - it’s part of the game and the fun of the tasting, obscuring the whiskies with duplicitous positionings, making them harder to spot and thus really challenging the palate and one’s whisky knowledge. Combine this approach with some extreme flavours and things get tough.  Here’s how the whiskies tasted, with some scores for those who are keen too… Amrut Kadhambam Single Malt 50% - 7.53 The first of our brace of Indian malts from Amrut - known for their casky whiskies and probably best of all for the Spectrum, which sees the whisky finished in a bespoke cask made from staves of five different types of wood. The Kadhambam is every bit as much a Frankenstein's whisky, aged in a combination of Bombay blue brandy, rum and oloroso casks. With no age statement, it certainly seemed oaky and youthful, with a real melange of diverse flavours spanning apricots and tropical fruits to pot-pourri and cheesecake - and was a touch disjointed as a result.  Mystery whisky - Inchmurrin Madeira Finish 46% - 6.48 Our mystery whisky on the night and one that has been flying off the shelves at Regional Wines. Opens with a very sweet nose of oranges, honey, toffee and tinned peaches and follows on with a delicate sweet and fruity palate. This was like the sugar plum fairy performing dainty pirouettes on our palate, a real quaffer, but with all the big flavours on show it essentially found itself in the wrong lineup. Craigellachie Old Malt Cask 2006 11yo 50% - 7.03 This was the inteneded sounding board for the evening - a conventional cask against which to compare the others. It may have aged in an oloroso cask, but how many times had that cask been refilled? The results were light and floral and this whisky certainly joined hands with the Inchmurrin to perform a  delicate duette before realising it had unwittingly stumbled into a boxing ring of WWF madness. Retired hurt after being KO’d by the Kadhambam.  Talisker Distillers Edition Amoroso Finish 45.8% - 7.86 The first of a triplet peaty whiskies, and all from casks that should drive big, powerful, sweet whiskies and which would hopefully keep people guessing. Although the term Amoroso is very seldom used these days, and was once a catch all term for dulce sherries - so to expect flavours similar to a PX cask would not be foolish. The Talisker showed some real class lacking in the first three whiskies, with its savoury peat and winter vegetables that opened into maple smoked bacon notes. As one’s palate became accustomed to the peat, layers of stewed and dried fruits unfurled and there was certainly some depth to investigate. Benriach 22yo Dark Rum Dunder 46% - 7.12 The first of our two BenRiachs - and two very expensive whiskies for that matter. We tasted a BenRiach 22 yo single cask at the recent Benriach vertical and its gentle complexities had been lost in a sea of big bold flavours provided by a host of younger port and oloroso casks. These two Benriach 22yo’s were similar to that one in many respects, both quite gentle, but the peat, rum and PX flavours that had been liberally thrown at them detracted from the malt, obscuring the distillery style. This was fragrant, herbal and slightly plastic on the nose, the rum and peat combining in quite an unusual way and which just wasn’t to the taste of most people present. A malt too far perhaps? Take away the peat and there may have been a fruity, pretty whisky there, take away the rum and there may have been a pleasantly peaty number hiding underneath, but together, the results were confused. Benriach 22yo PX Albariza 46% - 8.01 The PX version did work better, with stewed fruits and raisin flavours holding their own next to the peat. I typically think of peat as adding savoury flavours - it’s decayed vegetation after all, but often peat can move into the realms of sweet, smoked meats. Combine this with the sweetness of a decent PX cask and you’re looking at a big, rich whisky. Ultimately lacked some depth and once again had me wondering how the malt underneath would have tasted given half a chance to shine through.  Amrut Portonova Single Malt 62.1% - 8.77 There’s a theory that Wellington likes alcohol, so there were no surprises that this 62% beast finished first. A massive nose of dark ghana chocolate, doris plums, date pudding and malt digestives sucks you in to a broad full palate of cherries and further confectionery. The alcohol gives the palate a textural quality that is bolstered further by tannins from the European oak. On the finish, some lighter citrusy elements begin to appear, wrapped in cocoa like a Terry's chocolate orange. Monumental - and another to add to our Best of the Best lineup which is taking shape nicely now.