It’s the weekend and you’re off to a party, or a dinner at a friend’s house or maybe you’re just heading home after a long week and Kool & the Gang are singing, “Celebrate good times, come on” in your head as you toe tap your way out the door. Standing in front of a sea of sparkling wine at your local wine shop your mouth goes dry, which one do you buy? The really expensive one because that’s going to be the best one, right? The prosecco because you heard it was in fashion, wait was that last year? Or the one with the pretty label because you can put it on Instagram? There is a sea of gorgeous bubbles out there and we are fortunate enough to have many made right here in New Zealand.
Méthode Marlborough is a collection of sparkling wine producers dedicated to making delicious, superior quality sparkling wine. Made in the traditional method as they do in Champagne, with the same grape varieties and with a minimum of 18 months ageing before disgorgement, you will find many familiar brands are members of this elite club.
Celebrating the inaugural Méthode Marlborough Day in March of this year, the producers put on a fantastic progressive evening of sparkling wine, fine food and entertainment, and at Spy Valley’s cellar door there was even a bubble machine! I was treated to a fantastic tasting and these are a few of my favourites below:
Louis Vavasour LV Méthode Traditionelle NV
$55
Slightly golden in colour with aromas of freshly baked bread with apple, and vanilla pod and underlying floral notes. The palate has a lot of weight, red apple and hints of ripe citrus with a softly rounded but vigorous bead and a long heady autolytic finish. Bold and daring!
No 1 Family Estate Cuvée Virginie 2016
$98
Gorgeous sweet vanilla, toasted brioche, ripe white peach and fresh honeycomb on the nose. A crisp, dry palate with fine persistent bubbles, apple and stone fruit flavours and lovely hints of red berries with a salt lick mineral quality on the finish. Refined and complex!
Hunter’s Mirumiru Rosé NV
$35
Pretty pale pink with a stunning silvery hue. Aromas of red cherry, raspberry, apple blossom and wet stone minerals on the nose. A lovely, dry palate filled with red fruit and citrus notes with light autolytic characters on the finish. Yes way rosé!
Words—Angie Atkinson: The Wine Writer
