Matahiwi Estate - Sauvignon Blanc 2004

The Wine:

Matahiwi Estate Sauvignon Blanc - 2004, Nelson.

We recently purchased this wine from Corporate Direct.
Online, from the winemaker it costs NZ$ 18

Tasting notes:

Direct from the winemakers website:

This wine's soft ripe flavoured style has flavours of gooseberry and fresh herbs and a long dry finish. We love drinking it with pasta dishes using fresh herbs and delicious summer salads. While this wine is very ready to drink now, it can also be cellared for up to two years.

The verdict:

I've never been one for the floral language that winemakers use. Every now and then I get the vague idea that I manage to smell 'berries' as promised in the marketing spiel, sorry I mean vintner's tasting notes.

Most of the time, however, the smells are very much more mundane for me. Our wine group gained the nickname "The Smelly Socks Club" as a direct result of one of the founder member's observations about the interesting odour that comes from a freshly opened bottle of French wine.

In this wine's case I have very little knowledge of gooseberries but am actually familiar with fresh herbs. There is a definite freshness to the 'nose' of the wine. It is light, palatable and certainly easy to enjoy. It is also dry as promised by the winemaker. If you check out the NZ reviews on the website you will be inundated with options to describe the flavours...

Gooseberry, passionfruit and fresh herb

Alive and sturmer apple with nice chunky overtones

nettley wine..

herbaceous wine with smooth, vibrant melon and capsicum flavours

No lack of choice then !?
Okay, like I said in the first of my wine reviews, I'm no MW so my take on this is fairly simple.

This is a very drinkable wine. Perfect for a summers day with a lovely barbeque and fresh salads. It is dry, but not overly so. It is green, but not grassy. It is reasonably soft, but does not disappear on the palate. On the whole I can actually recommend it as a purchase that you might want to consider.

P.S. if anyone can explain sturmer apple to me, I'd be obliged.