Pinot Gris Tasting Notes below…

Good day, David Evans here from Passage Rock Wines, an award-winning winery from Waiheke Island. I’m the co-founder and winemaker at this amazing winery. Today, I’m here to talk to you about our Pinot Gris.

So, Pinot Gris is one of New Zealand’s most popular white wine varieties. We’ve been growing Pinot Gris here for about 20 years, and it’s proven to be the rising star in our wine portfolio.

Today we’re trying the 2023 Pinot Gris. As many of you know, Pinot Gris comes in many different styles and formats, but we have chosen to make our Pinot Gris in a dry style. This way, you get to enjoy it with your food a little bit better and see the flavours in their true forms.

This is our 2023 Pinot Gris. This vintage comes from a slightly wetter season, but we managed to select amazing fruit. We hand-select our berries every year to ensure that everything that goes into the glass is in very good condition. When you get this wine, you’ll be able to look at it over a white background and see a very slight tinge of pink. That’s because we’ve left the wine in its true format. Pinot Gris is actually a pink grape, not a white grape, and that shows through in the colour sometimes.

I’m going to give it a little swirl and then explain the aromas to you. When I smell this wine, I think of a pine forest—you can smell a little bit of pine needles, not too strong. Then I think of a freshly cut pear and a little bit of lemon blossom from a citrus tree. It’s got a really lovely floral, playful aroma.

On the palate, you get this lovely hit of really good fruit as it first impacts your palate. What you notice is this wine really coats the whole tongue in a beautiful way because we’ve made it in a dry style. You don’t get an attack of sweetness; you get a lovely, savoury but fruity and playful palate. What I think is great about this wine is it goes well with food. It has these lovely flavours that linger and work well with just about every kind of food you can put on the table. It’s a really great lunchtime wine, a really great aperitif wine, and if you’re trying to decide on a wine between a group of people, this one is great because it’ll appeal to most people. It’s not polarizing like some Chardonnay or Sauvignon Blanc; it’s a wine that offers something for everyone.

One of the things that makes our Pinot Gris a little bit different is that we’ve got a small band of eucalyptus trees around our vineyard, which gives the wine a slight eucalyptus mintiness. That adds to the complexity and savoriness of the wine. Along with the eucalyptus flavours, we also have a maritime climate at Passage Rock. We’re located right next to the ocean, which gives us an even temperature over the season. Our nights don’t get extremely cold, and our days don’t get extremely hot. This means the grapes ripen slowly and steadily, picking up a little bit of saltiness from the ocean. The slow ripening process ensures that when we pick these grapes, they still have beautiful aromas—they haven’t been overcooked by the sun.

If you take a look out there, you’ll see Te Matuku Bay. It’s a marine reserve and a lovely, pristine environment. We’re surrounded by hills, forests, and bird reserves. It’s truly a tranquil environment.

So if you’re ever on Waiheke Island, make sure you come and look us up. Cheers! If you’ve enjoyed this video, give us a like. If you want to buy some of this wine, go to our shop listed below. And if you like this video, you’ll be able to check out some of our other wines as well. Cheers!