New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc: 20 from 2020

As with so many wine regions, New Zealand had its share of new and unexpected challenges for the 2020 harvest in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

But a high-quality fruit harvest across most wine regions, in addition to the New Zealand Government listing the wine sector as an ‘Essential Service’, came as real blessings.

Scroll down for 20 top New Zealand Sauvignon Blancs from the 2020 vintage

The 2020 vintage has been an excellent year for New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, with an increase in plantings, crush, fruit quality, ripeness and flavour. Nearly all of the early-release wines I’ve tasted have punched above their weight (some well above) in terms of concentration, purity, balance and complexity.

Regional signatures are strong, and techniques in the winery such as extended lees contact, less use of new oak and gentle handling has captured more of this variety’s subtleties, minerality and vine maturity.

‘Clean and ripe, good concentration without being overblown, and beautiful fragrance,’ is how Chris Scott, chief winemaker of Church Road Wines, describes his 2020 Sauvignon Blancs.

‘2020 was an exceptional vintage,’ agrees Ben Glover, winemaker at Zephyr Wines in Marlborough. ‘The region expressed itself well, with the mineral, salty, stony soil attributes loud and strong, along with riper yellow fruit flavours – particularly physalis (cape gooseberry) and honeysuckle.’

‘It’s a Goldilocks vintage,’ adds Anna Flowerday, winemaker at Te Whare Ra Vineyard and Winery in Marlborough. ‘Not too cold, not too hot – just right. Favourable conditions during flowering led to a nice, even set and moderate crops.’

New Zealand’s dominant variety

Of New Zealand’s total area under vine planted across all varieties (39,935ha), Sauvignon Blanc continues to command the lion’s share. It grew from 24,605ha in 2019 to 25,160ha in 2020.

A total of 326,058 tonnes of Sauvignon Blanc was crushed – that’s 73.58% of the country’s total – an 8% increase on 2019. Pinot Noir comes in distant second with 7.7% of the crush and Chardonnay with 6.2%.

Marlborough remains the largest regional producer of Sauvignon Blanc, with a whopping 295,301 tonnes crushed, followed by Hawke’s Bay (12,422), Nelson (7,868), Gisborne (4,376), North Canterbury (3,773) and Wairarapa (1,771).

Todd Stevens, winemaker at Neudorf in Nelson, says: ‘2020 was extremely good for Sauvignon Blanc. The mild-to-warm spring, December rains and then a dry summer was a sequence that culminated in near-perfect conditions to ripen fruit and make exacting, delicious wines.’

Misha Wilkinson of Misha’s Vineyard in Central Otago said that while yields were well down in the region, Sauvignon Blanc did very well. ‘We grow ours on a perilously steep slope and unusually this year it was the first variety we picked. It is already showing fabulous flavours.’

An evolving and ageworthy wine

Style-wise, New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc is evolving. In the 2020 wines I tasted for this article, I noticed more texture, mouthfeel and layering from lees contact. Producers are leaving grape skins in contact with the juice for longer, as well as using older barrels of varying sizes for fermentation, ageing or both.

The classically pungent, herbaceous and tropical style expected of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc is easily on show for many of the wines I’ve recommended, but even these are showing more purity from vine age and what is clearly a remarkably good vintage.

Pied de cuve (cultivating the naturally occurring wild yeasts on the grape skins in the vineyard) is proving a valuable technique to produce wines with more depth, character, site expression, texture and flavour.

And while most wine lovers enjoy their New Zealand Sauvignon Blancs within the year of vintage, don’t be afraid to keep them – the style is more ageworthy than you think. Have a look at my drinking windows: many of these wines will develop over the next five to eight years with ease.

New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc 2020

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