Esk Valley Winemakers Reserve Merlot / Cabernet Sauvignon / Malbec, Gimblett Gravels, Hawke’s Bay

Description

Esk Valley Estate Winemakers Reserve Blend is a merlot dominated blend from the Gimblett Gravels wine-growing region.

Esk Valley is a boutique winery located in the Hawke’s Bay wine-growing region of New Zealand’s North Island. Esk sources fruit from Hawke’s Bay, including the very highly regarded Gimblett Gravels, and Marlborough. Their most famous wine is Esk Valley The Terraces which is made from grapes grown on terraced banks above the winery. Their winemaker’s reserve range of wines is also very highly regarded. Esk Valley Winemakers Reserve wines are made from grapes selected from the wineries best and low yielding vineyards in the Gimblett Gravels. The winemakers red blend was also the wine which pioneered the use of Malbec in Bordeaux blends in New Zealand.

The grapes for Esk Valley Estate Winemakers Reserve Blend are hand picked, destemmed and then fermented in Esk’’s open top, 75 year old, concrete fermentation vats where it is hand-plunged (four times a day) and left on the skins prior to being pressed off into barrels for malolactic fermentation. The wine is aged in French oak barriques (40% new) for 16 months. Each parcel is vinified separately and then blended, rested in tank and finally bottled.

Esk Valley Estate Winemakers Reserve is a blend of Merlot 56%, Cabernet Sauvignon 30% and Malbec 14%.