Wines of Supernatural Wine Co., Hawke’s Bay

These tasting notes accompany our feature on Hawke’s Bay as part of our New Zealand 2020 series


White and Sparkling Wines

(2020) I really enjoyed this cloudy, unfiltered gently sparkling wine, made in steel tanks with wild yeast, it ends up very dry with around 3G/l sugar. Straw to pale yellow, lovely lemony fruit, spicy with a peppery note, there is biscuit from the lees ageing. Bursts with bright lemon fruit, so much vivacious, ripe pear fruit, mouthfilling sweetness of fruit, and the dry, yeast and lightly nutty finish.
(2020) I guess slightly more orthodox than some here, but only slightly: still 10 to 12 months on lees with a little skin contact before pressing. Fine, elegant apple skin and lemon, has an interesting herbal character, lightly spicy and has a yeasty autolysis. Lovely palate, peachy, spicy with a bold rosy apple fruit, nice apple and pithy lemon acids. Price and stockist is for the previous vintage at time of review.
(2020) Quite a deep yellow/emerald colour, a touch of that yeasty, wheat beer character also citrus peel. On the palate, nectarine, or rather the skins of nectarines and peaches, so much grapefruity tang to this, bone dry and pithy in the finish.
(2020) Originally made as a proportion of the fruit destined for the Green Glow bottling. Skin contact, made in old wood. Yeasty, more wild than Green Glow, with herb and vegetal notes that are intriguing, the lemon rind and full peachy, ripe juicy pear fruit, finishing with great clarity. The 'Minus 220' refers to the fact this has no added sulphur, AKA 'Preservative 220'.
(2020) Skin fermented, a lovely rose gold colour. Seven days on skins which is less than normal, but first time this wine has been made since 2016, as you need perfect fruit to do skin contact. Briary and lightly earthy, toffee, tobacco, seeds and nuttiness, with such a lovely blast of fruit, peach kernels and pithy orange. No UK retail stockists listed at time of review.

Back to Supernatural Wine Co. profile in our feature on Hawke’s Bay

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