New Zealand’s Kumeu River Winery consistently produces some of the world’s best Chardonnay. Jancis Robinson describes them as “pristine Chardonnays that have withstood blind comparisons with some of the best white Burgundies.”
Kumeu River dates back to 1944, when Mick and Kate Brajkovich planted the first vines in Kumeu about 20km northwest of Auckland. Currently managed by the third generation, the family-owned winery through “patience, adaptability and dedication to quality” has build a reputation for producing high quality wines.
The year 2023 marks the 30th vintage of Mate’s Vineyard Chardonnay, Kumeu River’s most iconic wine. To celebrate this milestone, Paul Brajkovich, Marketing Director, hosted a vertical tasting of 19 vintages of Kumeu River Mate Vineyard stretching back from 2004 to 2022.
This also marked a rare opportunity to assess the ageing ability of an extensive flight of wines bottled under screwcap closure. Kumeu River was one of the early adopters of screwcap closures due to the prevalence of cork taint caused by TCA (2,4,6- trichloroanisole). The chemical compound impacts the sensory qualities of the wine leading to mouldy, damp flavours and robbing the wine of its primary fruit aromatics. Back in 2001, it was a risky proposition as there was no track record of how wines would age under screwcap and due to the uncertainty of consumer and the on-trade’s acceptance and perception of this bottle closure.
In 1999, AWRI (Australian Wine Research Institute) started trialling and comparing the ageing of wine under various closures. After 20 years in a technical note dated October 2020, AWRI stated, “screwcaps demonstrated better performance to other closures for retention of sulphur dioxide, freshness of fruit, and lowest development of yellow/ brown colour. This was followed by the two manufactured corks, and then the two grades of natural cork.”
The report concludes with the remark that “screwcaps demonstrated superior consistency in preserving both red and white freshness without causing adverse sensory effects.”
There were some big takeaways from the Mate Vineyard’s Chardonnay tasting. Firstly, New Zealand Chardonnay has the capability to age, gaining complexity and multi layered flavours and palate texture. Brajkovich says that the wines with 7 to 10 years of bottle age still show freshness, and beyond 10 years they display gamier and truffle like aromas.
The second takeaway is that wines bottled under screwcap provide a suitable environment for wines to age reductively and keep the wine pristine and preserve wine quality. The wines showed perfect clarity and provided a clear snapshot of the specific vintage character adding to its unique personality.
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