Black Estate Home Waipara Chardonnay 2018

Black Estate Home Waipara Chardonnay 2018Straw, white gold hue. Aromas of grapefruit, hazelnut, orange blossom nectarine and sea spray. The palate is rich pure and integrated with a dense core of concentrated fruit. The flavours taper to a salty mineral and long finish. This is an unfiltered wine with small amounts of sediment. Please allow the bottle to stand and settle before pouring. Decanting will allow maximum expression of aroma and purity of fruit to emerge. This Black Estate Home

Straw, white gold hue. Aromas of grapefruit, hazelnut, orange blossom nectarine and sea spray. The palate is rich pure and integrated with a dense core of concentrated fruit. The flavours taper to a salty mineral and long finish. This is an unfiltered wine with small amounts of sediment. Please allow the bottle to stand and settle before pouring. Decanting will allow maximum expression of aroma and purity of fruit to emerge.

This Black Estate Home Chardonnay was grown on 3.8 hectare and 1.0 Ha vineyards located 6 kilometres North East of the Waipara Junction, in the Omihi sub-district of Waipara Valley, North Canterbury. This is a north facing sedimentary clay fan on a gentle hill side slope. The soils are mainly Awapuni clay with calcium carbonate deposits. The un-grafted Mendoza Chardonnay vines were planted in 1994 at a vine density of 1841 vines per hectare. The new planting completed in 2011 has 1.0ha planted at 6177 vine/ha with Mendoza, 95, 548, and 1066 clones. The Home Vineyard is fully certified organic with BioGro.

Moderate winter rain fall allowed budburst to occur in spring with the soil at field capacity. A mild frost free spring meant rapid and even establishment of canopies. Six weeks of no rain in late spring brought on an early and rapid flowering that was complete across all blocks and all varieties within 7 days. Intermittent rainfall from December through the remainder of the growing season created useful vigour but increased the requirement for under vine weeding, canopy thinning and trimming. A hot humid summer increased the risk of disease from powdery Mildew or botrytis so our vineyard team worked tirelessly right up to harvest removing leaves and some fruit to create maximum ventilation in the canopies and ensure we could harvest ripe and disease free fruit. Harvest commenced mid-march and was condensed and early in most blocks. . Diligent hand harvesting was crucial checking that each bunch was suit-able for harvest. Growers in the region were very grateful for warm, dry, and windy conditions from March 25 to April 8 2018 that finished off ripening perfectly. 2018 will be remembered as a vigorous, warm, and humid season that was demanding but produced outstanding fruit.

A 15 percent portion was foot crushed then all grapes were whole bunch pressed over a 4 hour press cycle. The juice was not settled, and no additions were made except vineyard derived yeast. Fermentation by yeast propagated from a vineyard starter from the Home vineyard in 500L tight grained French casks (23% new wood). The wine matured on fermentation lees and went through full malo-lactic fermentation in early spring. Blended to tank after 10 months. No fining or filtration. Contains sulphites. 30ppm added.