Loveblock Gewürztraminer - Estate 2020

Pale gold with hints of green. Classic perfume of rosewater and Turkish delight, with a touch of jasmine and orange zest. Hints of guava, sweet mandarin and blood orange on the palate. Finishes with good rounded texture and nice acid tension.

Loveblock Marlborough Gewurztraminer (Estate) Tasting Notes with Erica

Relatively unique in Marlborough, the grapes for this wine were sourced entirely from our family-owned Hillside vineyard in Lower Dashwood, where the elevated and windy location challenges the vines.

Dependent on vigour, the vines were cane pruned to either one or two canes and trained to vertical shoot position. The warm spring of 2019 brought on a quick flowering of 3 days. The grapes were green thinned at veraison to aid even ripening in the autumn. Due to the challenging location and the pruning of the vines, yields were low when harvested. The grapes were harvested in two tranches, the first on the 17th of March and the second on the 23rd March 2020. The second tranche was picked later as a result of the uneven ripening on the eastern/poorer end of the vineyard.

Once at the winery, the grapes picked first were harvested were crushed, destemmed, must chilled and pressed on juice. The juice spent approximately 6 hours in contact with skins in order to lift the pH and imbue the final wine with more aromatic flavours. The grapes harvested later in March were crushed, destemmed, must chilled and pressed immediately (with no skin contact). The two sets of juice were blended and then floated, warmed and inoculated with M2 aromatic yeast. A cool fermentation followed and when the wine was deemed in balance (in residual sugar, alcohol and acidity) the ferment was stopped. The wine was then stabilised, filtered and bottled in June 2020.