Sauvignon Blanc is a year-round wine for most wine drinkers but I have to buck the trend. There is something about the vibrant summer sunshine in a glass of sauv that shrieks to me of ... well, summer!
Hot summer days have been few and far between thus far but a cool, crisp sauv blanc on a warm summer's evening is one of those combos that just works.
My regular panellists, Messrs Collins and McLaren, joined me on (yet another) coolish morning, to taste these odes to summer.
Price: $19.95
Rating: Good to very good
Pungent, sweet fruit nose, powerful green capsicum and subtle hints of passionfruit and sweat. Ripe tropical fruit notes on entry yet remaining tangy and zesty. While rounded and textural this seems understated at first, building notes of bruised apple on a sweet core, finishing more and more tangy.
Enjoy now.
Price: $19.99
Rating: Good to very good
Fruit Jube, a sweet fruit and floral element here yet with a typical grassy, gooseberry undercurrent lurking. A grippy note on the palate counterbalancing the hints of gum, gooseberry and grassiness, which extends on the close.
Very easy drinking and a long finish.
Price: $17.29
Rating: Very good
Citrus, cut grass, funk, smoke and a marked capsicum note. The palate leads with passionfruit before Granny Smith apples sweep in. Relatively intense at first, then softens and mellows with a good carry of flavours. The finish remains crisp and bracing, becoming more grassy.
A nicely worked package.
Price: $12.99
Rating: Very good to excellent
Relatively shy nose showing perfume and talc. The palate belies that with punchy gooseberry and grassy notes, and a lovely backdrop of wet stones. Crisp acidity here yet nicely balanced with the flavours filling the mouth.
It deliciously sashays across the palate and is fabulous value for money.
Price: $27
Rating: Excellent
Flinty, slightly funky nose, with wildflowers, wild herbs and a spicy note. Intensity on entry, palate grip and a peppery note (horopito, but without the burn). A textural palate, flavours filling every corner of the mouth and lovely flow to a long, juicy close.
Not, perhaps, your typical Marlborough sauv but delicious.
Price: $26
Rating: Very good
A subtle nose; perfumed with tropical fruits. The palate continues the tropical notes with a grassy core running through the wine. Good texture, whistle-clean and crisp, building notes of apple on a sweet-and-sour finish.
This builds in depth as it opens up in the glass, becoming quietly moreish.
