TASTING NOTES

Cloudy Bay Te Koko 2005 offers a tantalising medley of aromas … ripe citrus, green mango and passionfruit imbued with lemon thyme, fresh ginger and exotic spices. The finely structured palate balances a nougat-rich generosity with citrus fresh succulence and a delicious mineral edge … leading to a long, lingering finish.

VINEYARD
The sauvignon blanc grapes for this wine were sourced from two Cloudy Bay estate vineyards and one grower vineyard in the Fairhall and Central Wairau sub-regions. The soils are predominantly free draining gravels requiring irrigation. A combination of Vertical Shoot Positioned (VSP) and Scott-Henry canopy training systems were employed with vines planted at a density of 1,850 vines per hectare. In 2005 the vineyards yielded an average of 10.0 tonnes per hectare.

THE SEASON
The season started well and early spring conditions were settled with a couple of chilly mornings, but thankfully, no frost damage. The weather during December and early January was unseasonably cold and cloudy with consistent, intermittent rainfall. This led to variable flowering and resulted in tonnages on the low side of average. The weather improved considerably during January and for the rest of the summer fine conditions prevailed. By the time harvest commenced the season had ‘clocked up’ enough sun to catch-up with the long term average of heat summation levels. Harvest commenced under sunny skies but an unwelcome cold spell produced a couple of inches of rain and delayed picking over Easter. A dry April allowed the rest of harvest to be completed at a very measured pace. The light crop loads meant all vineyards were able to ripen in the cool Marlborough autumn and when a record frost occurred over most of the valley on the 25th of April the majority of Cloudy Bay’s vineyards had been harvested.

HARVEST
Batches of fruit from five vineyards were picked according to flavour profile and maturity between the 15th of April and the 29th of April, averaging 24.0 Brix, pH of 3.12 and titratable acidity of 11.1 g/l.

VINIFICATION
The grapes were harvested in the cool of night to preserve fruit flavour and a mixture of whole bunches and de-stemmed fruit was loaded directly to tank presses. After settling for a period the juice was racked directly to French oak barrels (a low proportion of which were new), and allowed to undergo a slow spontaneous fermentation using indigenous yeast. The primary fermentation, which took until Christmas to complete, was followed by partial malolactic fermentation. The wine was subsequently left in barrel, on yeast lees until the end of November of the following year when it was racked, lightly fined for clarity, and bottled (under screwcap) in March 2007. Analysis shows the wine to have a pH of 3.32, acid of 6.25 g/l and an alcohol of 13.9%v/v.