Your Next Lesson: New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc

I tried the 2016 vintage of Astrolabe, Loveblock, Kim Crawford, Cloudy Bay, and Dog Point

0. Dog Point - the best of the five wines. less ferociously pungent than most Marlborough wines. It had tropical fruit, pungent gooseberry but was more balanced and didn't need food. It was the only wine that I would have been happy to drink three nights in a row.

1. Kim Crawford - This must have been the fifth bottle of this vintage I've had and it was amazing - more pungent, assertive gooseberry notes than prior bottles. The pungency was balanced with enough fruit to be yummy. I don't know if the variation was my palate, the food, or that the bottles came from different stores.

2. Loveblock was interesting, at first tastes like typical Marlborough, high acidity, green. grapefruit but also interesting tropical fruit flavors - some I couldn't name

3. Astrolabe was grassy, green, less tropical fruit than I remember prior vintages. Ok but not the amazing that I remember.

4. Cloudy Bay - was flat and the most disappointing. 30 years ago Cloudy Bay was the sauvignon blanc that introduced me to New Zealand wines. At that time, living in London, stores would have a small allocation that would sell out in days or a week, and it seemed like a magical, unique tasting wine. The bottle i had was completely fine, marginally better than the Astrolabe but more than twice the price.

We were very pleased with the wines selected for this tasting and learned a lot. Our opinion in the past was that New Zealand Sauvignon Blancs were of a limited scope. Our monikers were: Lemon and grass. It turned out only one of these wines filled this order, and even that one was still considered quite good.
The Huia was our unanimous favorite and the first one we tried. We found it reserved, non-herbaceous, with kiwi fruit and lime scent. When paired with a Halibut Crudo with cucumber and sunflower it turned out to be a perfect match. We noticed the tartness sooner but it went away and made a well-balanced mouthful.
The Seresin Momo was a completely different experience. We found some fruit but with a chalky savory edge. It seemed flat and manipulated and a far cry from any NZ Sauvignon Blanc we had ever had. When served with a tomato Gazpacho with lobster sauce and edamame puree, it did not seem to smooth out and had an unfriendly back-end.
The Cloudy Bay was last and we found the grass and grapefruit we were expecting but with undertones of floral notes that made it quite different than the usual puckering that happens with the grapefruit. It was served with sea scallops, creamed corn and chanterelle mushrooms; topped with crème fraiche. We noticed that the creaminess of the dish brought out more grapefruit. Thanks for this eye-opening experience.
George Erdle – Harper’s Fine Dining – Charlotte, NC

We were able to find all three. The first night we had them with leftover Sam Sifton’s three-cup chicken. Maybe not a perfect pairing but I was eager to open the bottles and the leftovers needed to be eaten. The next night we had them with Melissa Clark’s feta-brined chicken, a perfect pairing for me. Aroma — I would say herbs more than grass, sorrel or lemon thyme. Distinctiveness — less minerality than Sancerre the one SB I am familiar with. Texture - sometimes sharpness is nice and sometimes you want creaminess. It depends on what you are eating. The Huia had the most tingle as it hit the tongue but it felt lighter. I thought the Cloudy Bay had a hint of bitterness which I enjoyed and would readily drink again. A good summer lesson.

Add O'Dwyers Creek and Goose Bay to your list as well. Lovely nose, crisp acidity and lick-a-stone minerality.

Cloudy Bay dinner was char with charmoula (worth it just to say it!) tinyurl.com/ybnbbjh3 and a tomato basil salad tinyurl.com/ya2n6tbe , fresh anchovies subbed for white (too vinegary for me).

The CB did not impress. Instead, it confirmed all, or mostly all, my NZ SvBl preconceptions. It was a pleasant enough sipper, citrusy with a well-balanced sweet attack, tart finish. On the plus side, its grapefruit was not overbearing, its mouthfeel had a tiny bit of fizz, and for one brief moment it lit up the charmoula’s cilantro. I haven’t noticed any prominent grassiness in any of this month’s three, but somehow that quality must be what makes them work so well with leafy herbs.

On the minus… Barb and I both found the CB “generic,” with nothing the least bit special going on that I could discern. It was ok with the meaty fish, but there’s no shortage of wines I’d have preferred. With the salty, garlicky, Italiano salad, again, the CB was acceptable enough, but about as compatibile as a kiwi.

It did best with an after-dinner chunk of Humboldt Fog goat cheese, where its lemon balanced and contrasted the cheese’s tang. Still, nothing wonderful.

For me, the standout this month was the lively and fun Huia, which I’d gladly rebuy. The others? Well, maybe for this grapefruit, scallop, bacon recipe tinyurl.com/yc4zxrv3 that I never got around to? And they’d be fine as party aperitifs. Otherwise, not in any rush to try again.

We tried three wines this month -- 2016 Craggy Range Martinborough; 2016 Cloudy Bay Marlborough; 2015 Momo Marlborough. For dinner we had salmon.
The Craggy Range was the most distinctive of the three. It had a very strong grassy aroma and a strong grassy taste with a lot of character. The alcohol in the wine was front and center. We are used to white wines being more passive -- this one was assertive without being aggressive.
The Cloudy Bay had a subtle metallic aroma that was hard to pinpoint. It had a taste of grapefruit and metal. It was also slightly effervescent.
The Momo was the least expensive of the three. It had a subtle peppery aroma with a grapefruit citrus taste.
The second two wines were what we would consider more typically like American Sauvignon Blancs. Of the three, we preferred the Cloudy Bay.

I work here at a small wine shop here in Dallas, Texas, and we sell a LOT of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc in the summer time. One particular New Zealand Sauv Blanc we sell is called Ranga Range (meaning "gentle breeze" in Maori). It is not overly grassy and grapefruity (like most New Zealand Sauv Blancs tend to be), and there is a touch of sparkling essence to it, as well. It goes GREAT with spicy Asian food (think Thai green curry), as well as lighter seafood dishes.

These and other Sauvignon Blancs are great with seafood. And its light wine for the evening chat. Or whatever you're doing.

Hi, it's David from Poland. I wasn't able to get two of your wines and the Clody Bay was too expensive, so I picked one of the NZSB from the wine store I work in: the Gravel and Loam. And that's what its smell was and how it tasted. Very stony, like wet rocks with some flint notes like the australian chardonnays I'm familiar with. When it opened a bit, it revealed some "cat litter box" notes. Stil, very pleasant, super-fresh wine with green notes of the gooseberry and grass. Not exactly like the NZSB I had earlier, as those were more fruity with aromas of pear and passionfruit. Since it was a fresh wine with lively acidity, I paired it with hot thai curry with chips. It went well with the dish, as it refreshed my mouth after each spicy bite. The wine was a little bit salty, which turned out to work well as a condiment. I think it would go even better with fish or some seefood. As for the chips, the wine started to bubble gently on my tongue when I washed them with it. It felt like I was drinking some dry version of moscato. At some point, the wine opened completely, revealing very nice notes of canned peaches. It was nice to find it there, since despite the freshness, I didn't really like this whole stoniness of the wine. Because of some sweetness which came with that new aroma, it went even better with my spicy dish. The wine became roundier and fuller, thanks both to the sweetness and saltiness; dry and mineral on the one side with ripe sweet fruits on the other. Thank you!

I strongly recommend to any of you living in Southern California to have some of the wines with proper NZ food. Aroha Restaurant in Agoura Hills is magnificent and has a long list of "kiwi" wines to enjoy.

Astrolab is a favourite if you can find it. Delicious.

Finally the order with the three wine school wines arrived. We ordered Green Curry with mixed seafood from our favorite Thai place. We enjoyed it with brown rice and tasted all three wines. The wines really made the food shine. Flavors were more pronounced then ever before: Our green curry just tasted a lot greener. I can see how other wine schoolers liked basil-citrus dishes with these wines. Huia turned out to be my favorite with very mellow smell nice acidity and a green apple acidity. Very refreshing stuff. Momo had some fruit ester flavors between pineapple, bubblegum and artificial strawberry but not in a bad way. Of course the Cloudy Bay was great again. It’s herbal notes just click with that thai dish. But it did not stand out that much from the other wines this time.

I reordered all three can’t wait to have them with white anchovies on bread with butter and asparagus with lemon mayonnaise.

Our first New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc this month was Whitehaven. It had a very fruity tropical smell. We enjoyed the wine with grilled key west pink shrimp and scallops. There were grassy flavors, like lemongrass or bison grass (reminded me of Żubrówka). Then there was this chalky minerality, and a beautiful roundness which made me call this wine voluptuous. Starborough in comparison just tasted like condensed cave water. I caught myself actually liking this omnipresent wine weeks earlier not so much now. Then there was Kim Crawford which my wife called subtle. She seems to like this wine second best whatever happens, I didn't pay enough attention to it I think.

I discovered the Cloudy Bay at a local Grocery Store. We had it with hummus, crackers, and blanched asparagus. It seemed a far superior example of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc smelling and tasting like ocean breeze, lime and lemongrass, very elegant. Villa Maria was round and apple-like. Tasting side-by-side with Whitehaven it was tough to decide which is better we decided slightly better then Whitehaven, Cloudy Bay being far superior to both.

Try Goldwater. My brother I both love Whitehaven and then we had Goldwater. Worth a look if you like NZ SB.

A sunny, happy and appealing wine, the Huia, from its quirky handsome simple label on. It was a step up from the Momo and, I think, from any of the NV SvBl’s I’ve had in the past: Kim C., Mt. B., Villa M. et al. Its grapefruit flavors—which I’ve often found distracting in those others—were far more muted. Its grassiness, too, was not loud; it was apparent more as a bit of backbone to the light-in-weight wine that clearly wasn’t mineral or earth (to Barb, it seemed floral). Especially, though—even if it took Eric’s question and an old note to guide me to it—I enjoyed the H’s texture.

Our dinner menu—thank you, classmates—was lemon-basil chicken tinyurl.com/ycgm6skn and roast asparagus, plus, for its parsley, pasta aglio e olio tinyurl.com/y974q89x . None of the pairings felt “meant for each other,” and least so the pasta, where even the trace of grapefruit seemed odd. But there was an open, accommodating friendliness to the H that won me over. I noticed it first with the asparagus. A year ago I’d written that the bitter/sweet (and chez us, super-oily) vegetable had made a Kim Crawford feel both lean and creamy. Same last night with the H, and then some. Add in a hint of almost-fizz and the wine was like a warm sunny day in the mouth, washing away the oil, replacing it with yellow sweetness and just enough tart to invite the next go-round. I swear I heard it whisper in my ear, “don’t take me too serious. Let’s have a good time here.” And that we did.

I think I was chuffed!

If Wine School is about overcoming preconceptions, this month’s class has a hill to climb. I can’t think of a wine I’ve tasted more and desire less than NZ SvBl. Partly, it’s the pairing. Light, summery, salady dishes are not the foods I crave.

That said, I owe the Momo a debt of wine gratitude. My second-ever, about 5 years ago, was what got me serious about note-taking and attention-paying. I wrote then, “Oops. Bought 2nd x by mistake. Way too light. Would taste good with an apple.”

Had my third-ever Friday night, with a tasty lemon-basil-ricotta pasta tinyurl.com/y9bab9xd and the lowest of expectations.

Results were pleasantly mixed. Wine flavors, mostly grapefruit and other tropical citrus unnameable by me, were of course utterly foreign to the Italian dish, resulting in some sort of placeless, nouvelle pairing. Authentic nothing. However... I kinda liked it. Fresh and citrusy, I kept thinking how I’d take it for a hot night’s thirst-quencher over most of last month’s options. Slipped on Eric’s questions at the dinner table (that low-expectations thing), but rereading later, I wonder if texture was a part of what made the M surprisingly enjoyable?

I’ll say this: I’m looking forward to the next two SvBl’s more now than I was before. Big question is whether to try again bending these wines to the foods I like (like Fri. night’s pasta) or bending my menu to the foods they like (mmm, apple-grapefruit-frisée salad; not!).

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Update: Nice menu choices from Joseph and VSB.

If Wine School is about overcoming preconceptions, this month’s class has a hill to climb. I can’t think of a wine I’ve tasted more and desire less than NZ SvBl. Partly, it’s the pairing. Light, summery, salady dishes are not the foods I crave.

That said, I owe the Momo a debt of wine gratitude. My second-ever bottle, about 5 years ago, was what got me serious about note-taking and attention-paying. I wrote then, “Oops. Bought 2nd x by mistake. Way too light. Would taste good with an apple.”

Had my third-ever last night, with a tasty lemon-basil-ricotta pasta tinyurl.com/y9bab9xd and the lowest of expectations.

Results were pleasantly mixed. The M’s flavors, mostly grapefruit and other tropical citrus unnameable by me, were of course utterly foreign to the Italian dish, resulting in some sort of placeless, nouvelle pairing. It was authentic nothing. However… I kinda liked it. Fresh and citrusy, I kept thinking how I’d take this for a hot night’s thirst-quencher over most of last month’s options.

Didn’t follow Eric’s questions at the dinner table (that low-expectations thing), but rereading them this morning, I wonder if the M’s texture was part of what made it surprisingly enjoyable.

I’ll say this: I’m looking forward to the next two SvBl’s more than I was before last night. Big question now is whether to try again bending these wines to the foods I like (like last night’s pasta) or bending my menu to the foods they like (mmmm… apple-grapefruit-frisée salad; not!).

Yay Whitehaven! Having that tonight w/Melissa Clark rx for Classic Shrimp Scampi...just an NYTimes kinda Friday evening dinner!

Good Evening: My earlier post seems to have disappeared into the Internet ether, but still had some of the Cloudy Bay NZ 2016 three days later, so served it with lemon-basil chicken, roasted fingerling potatoes with garlic, and a Romain salad with edible flowers. Dessert: homemade strawberry sorbet. Music: Cloisters by Charlie Coxedge (2017). No idea who that is, but the album is astounding.

Color: very pale straw gold. Nose: grassy, pine, herbal (rosemary!), lemon, grapefruit, tropical fruit. Taste: same as the nose, plus floral, orange peel and fig components. Long finish, light bodied, good acidity, Juicy sort of mouth feel. Biggest difference between now and three days earlier was the food. Three days ago, only had appetizers, and the Cloudy Bay deserves/needs a full meal. The basil made the chicken and wine work together. The flowers in the salad complemented the floral and grassy character of the wine. Not sure how or why this happened, but the Sauvignon Blanc even went well with the sorbet! Did not expect that. And the Coxedge album offered the perfect background music. Must learn more about this musician.

Incidentally, have never had a New Zealand wine before. That alone makes this month's lesson a great success. Even better, still have a glass or two of the Cloudy Bay leftover--and that NY Times recipe for salmon and jalapeños looks very tempting...

Was finally able to get the Momo in here in Paris, paired with an asparagus quiche (for my wife) and a mozz/shallot/summer squash one for me. I really liked this wine, it had a great deal of depth and charm, a lovely metallic gold hue as well. Everything restrained and in balance but still pronounced, cut grass, lemony-lime peel, guava, a mild smoky/flinty minerality and a semi-long finish with a ghostly nod to a Sauternes (a creamy, textured sweetness that lingered) It had a viscosity that filled the mouth but lithe acidity that kept it tasting fresh and fruity. These seemed great summer wines, right next to roses’, that go great with light fare or on their own and, as we had last month, were real thirst quenchers as we sit through another atypical heat wave here. They held their own against the French versions I drank side by side, the NZ’s were a bit fuller and sweeter with the Loire bottles having a more mineral and herbal feel.

Sav blanc is a staple in our home with Sancerre and Pouilly-Fumé seeing the table often during the year, more so this time of year. My father, who lived in CA, was a huge fan of NZ sav blancs and he turned me on to Cloudy Bay and Kim Crawford but living in France, I have to stick with the Loire of course. With our garden cranking out all manner of squash and herbs, it was a great opportunity to cook up several different quiches and pair them with what I could find. The first one I tried was a 2015 Clean Skin from Marlborough, a designation that does not identify the producer but is often from a quality source, at 10GBP it was worth a try. It seemed a classic example, crisp and tart acidity, some tropical and white fruits in good balance, the grassiness more pronounced as the wine warmed. Very approachable and refreshing and paired very well with a zucchini, bacon and gruyere quiche. Second wine I tried a 2015 Tikohi, again from Marlborough and it was more tightly wound and sharp, more grass-like and drier than last night’s entry. It also had a more mineral feel, stony fruit flavors with only a kiss of the lush tropical stuff. Again, very pleasurable with another quiche of yellow squash and feta.

I'm a Kiwi and our group was "chuffed," as we say, that you chose New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc as your first non-American New World wine. Happily, we found Craggy Range 2015 Te Muna Road Martinborough. We had stayed at their Hawkes Bay vineyard cottages that same year. We also had Cloudy Bay 2016. We really liked both these wines, not surprisingly, as they are top-tier winemakers in the country.

We paired our wines with wild halibut served with a ragout of spring vegetables. Trying Craggy Range first, we found lemon, peach, apple and a sprightly tingle on the nose. It was very round, full in the mouth with pear on the finish, a trace of vanilla and a mineral/limestone quality. Cloudy Bay had similar fullness in the mouth, a trace of vanilla, perhaps more mineral. We thought this a tad sweeter than the first, almost a taste of honey. It penetrated more on the finish. These were not the cliched Sauvignon Blancs of passion fruit and grass. Both wines were straw colored, darker than other Sauvignon Blancs and complimented our meal well. They are certainly more fruity than the sauvignons of the Loire.

After a hiatus from wine school because we could not find your last few selections, we are glad to be back.

Go, Kim Crawford go.

What we need from this column is for it to orient itself around real wine. Almost everywhere we look we find the contrived and bogus.

I like the Cloudy Bay,but my favorite is still Nobilo,which is much better and even less expensive.

Try the south Australian sauv blancs. Yummy!

Like Eric Asimov, we used to drink NZ Sauvignon Blancs regularly, then tired of them. We did not mind the grassiness but a grapefruit edge started to dominate on our palates in an unpleasant way--until we found the delicious organic Loveblock Sauv Blanc. When we moved to Northern Manhattan and found the value-laden PJ wine store has terrific Sancerres for under $20, those became the main Sauv Blancs we have been drinking. But for one NZ Sauv Blanc a PJ salesman put us onto: Loveblock, an organic Marlborough NZ wine from an estate Kim Crawford started after selling his eponymous wine company. It has it's own distinctive flavor that separates it from other NZ Sauv Blancs we've tried, with a nice complexity combining fruit and minerality with the grassiness very subdued and in the background. It's now the only Sauv Blanc from outside the Loire we regularly buy.

I find it quite offensive that there is never any attention given to fine non alcoholic wines. I wish people would appreciate the subtle nuances of non- alc Sauvignon blancs. I had to give up alcohol once I converted to Islam, however upon tasting creamy non alcoholic Chardonnay , I never wished to go back.

I find the Reserve Sauvignon Blanc and the Sauvignon Blanc Marama from Seresin are in an altogether different league compared to the other run-of-the-mill, largely interchangeable New Zealand SB mentioned here. As distinctive and seductively complex in their (New World) way as the top wines from Sancerre or Pouilly Fumé (e.g. Domaine Vacheron).

we love Scarborough Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc with it's very sharp pear flavor. It is wonderful to sip by the pool in the tropical heat here in Baton Rouge. We find it on sale for $9.99. I find most other Sauvignon Blanc's to be flat and not worthy of purchase. The reds are very hard to drink in the summer heat with the complex flavors. We are generally a pinot family for red or whites as everyday dinner wines. And we are a wine buying and drinking family.

Oyster Bay is a little too tart, ditto the Kim Crawfords that turn up at Trade Joe's and Costco. Cloudy Bay is a nice special occasion wine.

too citrusy for me / opposite of white bordeaux in approach. when friends ask me what wines do i like? i usually answer anything but kiwi sauvignon blanc. as an aside i have heard both Graywacke and Dog Point are worth trying; interestingly both are made by ex-Cloudy Bay personnel i believe.

So the point of your lesson was that, despite it's popularity, you are fatigued by these wines? Not sure how to take your criticism.
Personally, I rather enjoy these wines, particularly from the Marlborough region.

I'm surprised that all comments on New Zealand wines never mentioned
Oyster Bay Sauvignon Blanc - a tasty wine for folks who love to drink a lot of it -
$10 at Trader Joe's - a bargain - and they also have another New Zealand
Sauvignon Blanc - Sauvignon Republic for $8.00 - very nice and tasty

i find these wines impossible to like. tasted many. hard to find one without obvious methoxipyrizine. how these became popular i have no idea. US and French wineries did years of research to eliminate it - which is fairly easy once you know.

Great list! Like some others here, Dog Point has been my consistent favorite, though can be hard to find. Kim Crawford is a great second choice, and available practically everywhere.

Best tasting, best value in this genre is Brancott Estate Marlboro Sauvignon Blanc. Around $10, you can find it practically anywhere. Try it once, you won't regret it.

Threee more Marlborough sauvignon blancs that we enjoy -- Kim Crawford, for $12-14, Matua, for around $12 and interestingly Kirkland (yes, THAT Kirkland, from Costco) for around $7-8.

Australian and New Zealand wines are doing well in China, perhaps because they are priced lower that the French. The Chinese are slow to shift to wine consumption but it is happening as much for prestige reasons as delight. California has no appearance here, maybe late getting to the distributors, but consumer awareness likely (says a former Sonoma County resident). A and NZ are huge trading partners and France is Paris and Wine. Local reds good enough for me, but I do miss home. “Sonoma produces wine, Napa auto parts” was the local joke.

A smaller region worth tasting is Hawke's Bay, near Napier on the East Coast. Best Pinot Gris and Pinot Grigio selection I've had.

I have been to New Zealand and had them; all delicious!

I love love love cloudy bay... and on Tuesday I was lucky to taste their te koko sauvignon blanc. Apparently it is aged in oak barrels for a bit... and, wow. Totally a new level.

I love NZ sauvignon blancs for sure, especially this time of year they are my summer water. But also love the pinot noirs, from cloudy bay and many others. Delicious stuff!

Dream is to visit NZ in person!

Since visiting New Zealand in 2006, most of the wine that I've drunk has been NZ, & primarily sauvignon blanc or pinot noir. Arona, Dog Point, Craggy Range, Lawson's Dry Hills, Whitehaven, Momo, Huia, & Cloudy Bay have all crossed our table in the last 11 years; Dog Point, Craggy Range, & Cloudy Bay are probably our favorites of those listed. Unfortunately NZ wines are more difficult to find in upstate NY, so our selection is limited. One SB not mentioned here is Starborough, which is one of the "zippiest" SB's we've tried & one of my favorites. My daughter shared a bottle w/her boyfriend, who hadn't had NZ SB before, & he loved it.

When we stayed in the center of the Dog Point vineyard, that prejudiced us toward that vineyard's sauvingnon blanc. But really, NZ sauvignon blanc brought me back to trying American sauvignon blancs, and I've had a fine time tasting many of them. It's a delicious, varied, and under-estimated white.

Your three recommendations are all from Marlborough. Indeed, Marlborough predominates so much wherever New Zealand wines are sold that it would be easy to assume it to be the sole region where sauvignon blanc is produced. But other regions are sources of superior wines—Canterbury, in particular; Mt. Beautiful is a representative, fairly well distributed example. Moreover, one need not confine oneself to the South Island, as I have just done. Superior sauvignon blanc also comes from several well established regions on the North Island—including the deceptively named Martinborough (to avoid confusion, better call it the Wairarapa Region). In short, I urge everyone to eschew Marlborough the next time and try something else.