2022 Clark Estate “Late Harvest” Pinot Gris

Silver Medal – New Zealand International Wine Awards

93 points / 5 stars            Sam Kim, Wine Orbit

Richly fruited and instantly appealing, the bouquet shows dried apricot, warm spice, orange peel and honey characters, leading to a succulent palate offering silky texture and creamy mouthfeel. Delightfully sweet and flavoursome with beautifully balanced acidity, finishing long and delectable. At its best: now to 2028. Feb 2023.

93 points / 4.5 stars            Bob Campbell, MW

Deep golden hue. Intense dessert wine with honey, caramel, honeysuckle, grapefruit marmalade and dried apricot flavours. Sweet, luscious wine with a firm acid backbone that prevents the wine from being too cloying. Drink 2023 to 2028. Feb 2023.

91 points Premium            Cameron Douglas MS

Deep golden hues lead to aromas and flavours of baked pears and apple tart-tatin, treacle and apple-pie. Very sweet with contrasting acid line, weighty with a silky-cream mouthfeel. Persistent, balanced and well made. Best drinking from today, with a sweetish dessert. Serve quite well chilled and in a very large glass.

95 points / 5 stars            Candice Chow, Raymond Chan Wine Reviews

Bright, even, pale amber. The nose is softly full and attractive, with aromas of roasted peach and apricot melded with cream brulee and spice. Full-bodied, roasted peach and apricot aromas intertwined with pear, honey, cream brulee and white floral. The wine has good weight and an oily mouthfeel, with brilliant acid balance leaving a moreish finish. 11.5% alc, 177 g/l RS. Feb 2023

4.5 stars            Michael Cooper Wine Reviews

Drinking well in its youth, the deep gold/amber hued 2022 vintage is fleshy, with rich, peachy, honeyed flavours. Showing a strong ‘noble rot’ influence, it has abundant sweetness, and a slightly oily, well-rounded finish.

Viticulture

When the weather conditions are ideal for this style, the grapes are left on the vine to rot into botrytised honeyed clumps. Once all the bunches have succumbed to the fungus known as noble rot, we pick everything. The beauty of pinot gris is the berries stick together rather than fall onto the ground. This allows us to pick virtually everything we have left, increasing our yield significantly.

Winemaking

The grapes were lightly pressed into a bin and the juice poured back into the press to help absorb all the delicious flavours as well as hydrate the driest berries. After 8 hours, the juice was pressed into barrels to complete fermentation.

Wine Analysis

pH        2.93

TA        9.3 g/L

Alc       11.5%

RS       177.0 g/L

Late in the year, as the leaves start to fall off, the weather cools down rapidly and the fruit begins to rot. At this stage, the cool temperatures and dry days let the botrytis fungi work its magic as it starts to reduce the berries into honeyed raisins. Conditions for this process are not always perfect, so when they are, we head out and pick what we can. Volumes are usually very small but the reward is heavenly.