Montepulciano 2023

Blackenbrook

Montepulciano 2023

Find one of Italy’s most intense and spicy wines made right here in sunny Tasman. Every drop of this ink-coloured wine will fill your mouth with cherry and spice goodness. 

 

        $36.00 NZD

        Tasting Notes

        Intriguing and generous, our Montepulciano 2023 brims with dark berries and clay earth complexity,
        toasty wood layers and moments of
        spice and mystery.

        The Montepulciano grape variety originates from Central Italy. Try it with a wood-fired pizza or a hearty venison stew – so good!

        Read Winemaker’s Notes

        Rich, bold and incredibly rare

        Just three rows or 0.2ha of this savoury Italian red are growing in our vineyard – and only 9ha in all of New Zealand.

        Montepulciano produces large, almost seedless berries of an inky black colour. With its extremely thick skins it’s well protected against disease, meaning we can pick the fruit about three weeks later than any other variety. It’s this late autumn ripening that gives us the unique colour and flavour concentration.

        Our Montepulciano will cut through some of the meatiest meats like New Zealand game or Italian hare ragu, and will also pair nicely with rich, roasted winter vegetables - enjoy!

        Reviews

        92/100 Stephen Wong MW

        Mid-purple. Black cherry, raspberry and smoky cinnamon oak express themselves with exuberance in this smooth and silky mid-weight wine. Ripe, gentle tannins with just enough acidity to give a twist of tart cherry on the mid-palate provide the canvas for the fruit-driven flavours to settle into more spice and seed complexity. A hint of violet sits alongside the wood on the finish, making for a very easy-to-drink style with a satisfying savoury layer 17 Jan 2025
        2025–2028

        Isabelle Schwarzenbach picking white grapes. She's working on a very old vine with a large trunk. The grass and leaf canopy are vibrant green and the sun is shining.

        The season

        Our 20th year of growing grapes at Blackenbrook Vineyard!

        Mother Nature gave us beautiful spring weather for flowering and pollination, setting us up for a good crop.

        Summer was quite wet and the vines grew at a crazy pace. We kept mowing, trimming and leaf-plucking the fruit zone but it was a real struggle to stay on top of the phenomenal growth.

        Going into harvest the fruit was clean but extremely fragile – and so were our nerves. But two weeks of stunning autumn weather was all we needed to hand-pick our biggest crop ever with beautiful ripeness and flavours – a challenging season with a happy ending.